Sonic the Hedgehog  The Masks we Wear
by TimeLordParadox
Summary: A cursed mask is discovered in the river which gives its wearer the power to alter reality at the cost of their minds. Can Sonic or his friends resist the addictive powers of the Mask of Loki and can they keep the mischievous thing away from Robotnik?
1. Prologue

**Disclaimer:** Sonic is owned by Sega and the Mask is owned by Dark Horse comics.

The Mask in this story is based off the Mask from the Newline Cinema movie.

* * *

**Sonic the Hedgehog**

**The Masks we Wear**

**By TimeLordParadox**

**(aka)**

**Ross Pickering**

**Prologue**

Tumbling through the void it went, the space between spaces, where it was space and time didn't exist as such and the tremendous forces pressing on it would've been enough to destroy anything and everything passing through this blackness. But for some reason this one small object defiantly refused to be destroyed by such miniscule and pathetic inter-dimensional forces which would rip anything else apart. It stubbornly kept its shape and its power.

Many times people have recognised what it was, the danger it held to those foolish enough to think they could tame the raw power it provided. It had no consciousness as such but if it did it would know something happened to it, somehow it had passed between the dimensions, another pathetic and futile attempt to destroy it but all they'd managed to do was to pass on this curse to another world where it will continue to do what it has been doing for centuries, causing mischief.

Suddenly the blackness wasn't so black anymore, pin pricks of light started appearing around it, fading into existence and the crushing inter-dimensional forces lifted as the object found its new home dimension. It was in the blackness of space tumbling end over end thousands of miles away from any suitable 'host'.

If it had any sense of movement it would know it was still travelling incredibly fast as it began to speed towards and get caught in the gravitational pull of a planet, a green and blue planet, a pleasant looking planet, a peaceful planet untouched by its mischievous ways.

It began to follow the curvature of this large blue marble as it descended towards its surface. The object began glowing a bright shade of green as it began skipping across the planet's atmosphere like a pebble would skip across a pond before sinking. It heated up to such extremes it glowed an even brighter shade of green but the intense heat wasn't even singeing it.

Those watching from below would've seen what looked like a green comet or shooting star in the sky as it rapidly approached the solid ground. Due to its momentum it was travelling almost parallel with the ground and it passed over the sea quickly it was all a blur. In the distance was land, a large continent was looming in front of it.

It passed over this land creating a thundering sonic boom, and due to its speed the sun above was giving the appearance that it was rapidly started to set, plunging the side of the planet it was now on into darkness.

It was so low now it was sure it was going to come down here, but it was coming to the other side of the continent and the sea was rapidly approaching. But before reaching the ocean it impacted the ground and bounced off it leaving a very long gash in the soil as it rapidly began spinning end over end and very fast due to its own momentum, momentum which propelled it over the cliff and out to sea and began travelling away from the solid ground.

It watched the land slowly start to recede away but it soon came to a sudden stop as it impacted the water with such speed it made the liquid feel like it was made of concrete. It sank a little ways into the ocean due to the force of the impact but still it was completely undamaged, not ever scratched. Bubbles formed around it as it slowly began rising from the inky depths. Anyone looking at it would've been able to see a slight afterglow as the cold sea rapidly cooled it down, the glow slowly vanished leaving no evidence that anything had hit the water except a few ripples on the surface.

Something small broke the surface, a very small object no bigger than a football, and anyone looking at it would not have seen anything remarkable about it. It was a mask, a very old looking green wooden mask with a metal bar running halfway down the middle of its face. The paint was pealing in places and the metal bar slightly rusted showing its age. You would've been forgiven for thinking this was just a piece of drift wood, or something mistakenly dropped from a ship or in a river, but you'd never believe this was the object that had just fallen from the depths of space.

It began drifting in the sea bobbing up and down and side to side with the waves as the current began to carry it closer to the continent it had passed as it flew through the sky. The tide was coming in on that land and this odd mask began to float closer and closer to its shores.

If it were alive in any shape or form or if it could feel any emotion at all, it would've been triumph. They had tried to destroy it and instead had just flung it here, onto the shores of another dimension. They had just past the problem on to the universe next door.

If it could laugh it would've. The Mask still existed, and now it was waiting, waiting for another foolish mortal to claim it and its power.

* * *

**Authors notes:** This is my very first attempt at a Sonic the Hedgehog story so I'd really like to know if I've got the characters right.

-cheers


	2. Hedgehogs and Mad Scientists

**Updated 25/03/2011:** Corrected an error where I kept mis-spelling Robotnik as Robotnic.

**Updated 19/04/2011: **Corrected a character mistake, originally I thought Dr. Robotnik called himself Eggman, but realised later on that 'Eggman' was an insult Sonic came up with that Robotnik later adopted.

* * *

**Act 1**

**Chapter 1**

**Hedgehogs and Mad Scientists**

The calm of a field of yellow daffodils was disturbed by a gust of wind which had no apparent source. They fluttered as if in the wake of something cutting through the air like a boat would cut through water, as if the air to this thing was thick enough to create such an effect, and to him that's exactly what the air was like.

The air in front of him tried everything it could to slow him down and stop him, the faster he went the more the air seemed to gain substance as if an invisible hand was trying to push him back and slow him down. But as each foot made contact with the ground his legs just pushed him further and further forwards, faster and faster. Nothing could slow him down short of a solid wall and there was no guarantee that would completely stop him either. Upward gradients slowed him down a little but not enough, it was always harder to run uphill then on level ground but as soon as he travelled over it was always plain sailing.

The air flowed around his head making the quills on his head flow backwards and point in the opposite direction of his motion. He had quills because he wasn't human in the technical sense of the word though he had humanoid features and limbs, arms, legs, hands, fingers, opposable thumbs but he had the features of a particular animal. He was, and proudly called himself a hedgehog, Sonic the Hedgehog.

He was running not because he had to get somewhere, not because he was late for some appointment, nor was he running to get away from some danger, he was running for the sheer enjoyment of it, enjoyment of the speed he could propel himself to. Everyone else had to use machines and devices to achieve his speeds while all he had to do was put one foot in front of the other.

Something shot over his head so fast he was almost startled by it, because he didn't hear it coming as it flew off into the distance followed by a loud bang of a sonic boom. It was a green glowing orb which must've been travelling faster than sound to make that noise. It vanished over the horizon as he watched. What the heck was that?

He changed direction to make that green glowing ball his destination, he didn't know what it was but the shear thrill of finding out flooded his veins. His forward vision was full of objects that he passed in a matter of seconds, trees, houses, people, rocks, everything just zoomed straight past him but he kept his cool and avoided them with ease by kicking his legs out and moving out of the way.

A cliff face came into his vision and he dug his red shoes into the ground, his shoes were the only thing that could effectively slow him down. All the running he does did often make their life expectance short but his sneakers were specially made because of all the punishment they had to endure.

He didn't come to a complete stop when he reached the foot of the cliff though, he only slowed down sufficiently enough for what he was about to do. He bent his legs and fired himself into the air with tremendous effort and was propelled so fast into the air that if any normal person impacted a cliff at that speed they would've been killed instantly. Sonic however used his forward momentum and forced it to propel him upwards as he began scaling the cliff face as easily as if it was level ground. Gravity slowed him down gradually but not fast enough as he reached the cliff edge and was launched into the air.

The ground around him passed below him as he rose into the air, 30 feet, 40 feet, 50 feet, then he started to come back down to terra firma. He landed on the ground placing one foot in front of the other to make his forward momentum stop him from simply slamming into the ground and began dashing off again.

He let his hands and arms trail back behind him as he put as much effort as he could into his legs to speed himself back up. People usually had to go on roller coasters to feel the thrill and adrenaline rush he was feeling right now as he started to swerve and avoid a large number of boulders randomly scattered around which he was now among. He was avoiding these easily enough and despite his speed he could turn on a dime or kick himself left and right to avoid large objects.

Another boulder blocked his path again, but this one he didn't intend to avoid as a grin spread across his face. As he approached, a few moments before impact he raised his arms above his head and brought them down towards his stomach, he then ducked his head down as well and felt his feet leave the ground sending him into a rapidly rotating roly-poly. Those watching him would've seen him as a rapidly rotating blue ball as he slammed into the side of the boulder and passed clean through it leaving a perfect circular hole all the way through.

He waited for his forward motion to slow down before he allowed his legs to extend out and send him back into a run again. He was completely unharmed by that stunt and he'd done it so many times it didn't hurt. That wasn't the only strange ability he had but they were the first few tricks he learned how to do, tricks which usually came in handy when it came to the sort of life he lead.

The horizon gave way to something else, something darker, it was hard to see exactly what it was but when the sound of waves crashing caught his ears he knew exactly what that was. It was the ocean, water!

His eyes grew wide as this registered and rapidly put his breaks on, leaning back at such an angle that if he weren't travelling so fast then he would've fallen over backwards. Water was his one weakness, it wasn't a weakness he was fond of but... simply put... even though he could do all these amazing tricks the one thing he could never do was swim. He always sank like a stone the moment he entered a body of water so he always avoided deep water if he could help it.

As he decelerated he allowed his body to slowly become more upright until he came to the very edge of the cliff where he managed to stop just before crossing the edge. Inside he gave a great sigh of relief as he stared out at the large body of water, long large ripples radiated from a central point which meant whatever it was that had swept overhead had landed in the water. He didn't care how curious he was of it he wasn't prepared to try to swim to it.

He crossed his arms as he stood there and for a few minutes and just watched the ocean, waiting as if whatever had landed would rise up again. The wind ruffled and blew his long quills which were still sticking backwards and slightly curved over towards the ground. After a few minutes he decided whatever 'it' was, it wasn't going to come out again.

It was a funny looking meteor through he had to admit, he'd seen shooting stars before and they usually didn't glow green, so whatever it was he doubted if it was natural. A number of possibilities passed his head. One of which was the most predictable idea he had, that it was an invention of his arch nemesis, a very fat, old scientist called Dr. Ivo Robotnik, or Eggman as Sonic and others used to call him for fun, but over the years Dr. Robotnik adopted it as his title, Sonic didn't know why, his large fat form did make him resemble an egg on legs but the Hedgehog couldn't understand why Dr. Robotnik decided to make it his nickname, all it did was suck the enjoyment out of calling the fat scientist the name, so in the end Sonic decided to abandon the nick name and start calling him Robotnik again. Maybe he'll come up with a more insulting nickname to call Robotnik one day.

Robotnik made it his life's ambition to conquer the world. He was probably the stereotypical mad scientist who created robots and machines which he planned to use to enslave the planet. But Sonic was always in his way, whatever diabolical scheme he came up with Sonic was always there to stop him and send him packing.

If that green ball was one of Robotnik's inventions then no doubt it would rise up to present itself as some massive robot ready to battle him. He looked forward to the challenge but as he stood there and waited nothing seemed to break the surface and the sea gradually became calm. Maybe it wasn't one of Robotnik's machines after all but if it wasn't then what was it?

He heard footsteps coming up to him, running very fast –though not as fast as he could- and before he could turn around to see what it was or react to it, it slammed into him bringing him to the ground. It wrapped its arms around him and held him in a very tight hug as whatever it was squealed loudly.

"SONIC!" said a high pitched girl's voice. Then he knew exactly who this was the moment she uttered the word. How did she always manage to find him? Did she have some sort of Sonic detector? Did she have a tracer on him somewhere? It can't be just dumb luck could it? "At last I have you!" she added.

Amy Rose, a pink fellow humanoid hedgehog who wore a red dress and matching boots refused to let him go so easily as he tried to break the hug she had him in. "Did you make a wish at the shooting star? I did and it came true, it brought you to me!" she squealed.

"Hey, take it easy" he said "I can't breathe!"

Put simply, Amy Rose was in love with him plain and simple, but tragically for her Amy's idea of companionship wasn't the same as Sonic's, which was tragic for him because sometimes she wouldn't stop following him around. "What did you wish for Sonic?" she asked.

_Do you need to ask?_ was the look Sonic had on his face but Amy couldn't see it as she closed her eyes and hugged him even tighter. Sonic didn't answer Amy's question though and she didn't seem to want to press the matter anyway as she broke the tight hug herself and she straightened herself up to ask

"Come on, this is the perfect place to view a sunrise and I know the perfect spot for us!"

Wait for several hours for the sun to come up? Not his idea of fun, his idea of fun was getting into dangerous situations and getting out without a scratch, fighting Dr. Robotniks machines, or just exploring places he's never been before, not sitting down staring at the same stretch of beach for the next four hours. Thankfully this odd moment was broken as a shadow fell over them both, and a manic chuckle almost punched the air. In the sky passing over the moon was what looked like thousands of tiny little insects but Sonic knew full well they weren't insects, especially not at that distance. They were robots, dozens of robots all following a round like vehicle hovering in the sky. It was Robotnik! Sonic never thought he'd be glad to see Dr. Robotnik. But what was he doing here?

This gave him the opportunity to slip from Amy's grasp. She was still waiting for his answer to her request "Sorry Amy, I'll have to get back to you on that!" and with one swift movement Sonic dashed off towards Dr. Robotnik and his gang of robots before Amy had a chance to complain to him.

"Sonic wait!" Amy screamed after him as she watched the blue hedgehog disappear into the distance. She kicked her feet at the ground in a huff "OHHHH that Sonic!" she said in annoyance.

* * *

High concentrations of carbon and iron material with a hint of iron oxide and a whole mass of energy, he realised as he rubbed his hands gleefully and smiled menacingly as he watched the readouts on his screen. Inside his hovercraft Dr. Robotnik was surveying the readings he took of that meteorite which came down in the area not five minutes ago. It landed somewhere here so it shouldn't take long to find, especially if it is still radiating all that energy as before.

He was a tall and a very fat man who wore a red jacket with coat tails over his black trousers. His head was completely balled but as if to compensate for the loss of hair on his head a long, orange, bushy moustache had sprouted from under his long, big, red nose.

"There is no visible crater Dr. Robotnik" said one of the robots hovering close to his craft.

"That's because it wasn't travelling at the right angle to punch such noticeable dent in the landscape." He explained, there was a very long gash in the landscape but that was no crater, a crater would insinuate that whatever it was had landed there, but it hadn't, it had bounced off somewhere around here.

"Perhaps we should start by looking in the sea, my calculations show it more likely it landed there" the robot explained

"No, we begin the search on land first" Robotnik commanded, he wanted to find it quickly before anyone else did, if it had landed in the sea then there was little chance anyone would find it until much later. But he didn't want to run the risk of someone coming across it if it came down somewhere on land "we'll expand out to sea" he added.

"You're already expanding" the robot said

"What?" he clenched his fists and his face turned red, he turned to shout at the robot "How dare you insinuate I've gained weight!"

The robot at first looked flustered, which Robotnik admitted was odd for a machine which had very simple emotions and desires " …I mean we've passed the proposed landing site" it added quickly in fear.

"Don't get smart with me!" he said calmly as he returned to the controls of his vehicle. He continued on looking at the readouts but he was sure he heard the robot mutter "I really don't have a choice."

* * *

What was with Sonic? Why couldn't he just give into his desires? Why did he always run away like that, does he like me? Were all questions Amy had running through her head. Why did he always run? It was maddening to her, she couldn't understand why, why, why, why, why?

She sighed to clear her head. How long had she been insinuating, hinting and often outright asking Sonic to go out on a date with her? Every time! That's what, and every time he always found some way of avoiding the question and getting away.

How long ago had it been? Years probably when they first met at Never Lake, when Dr. Robotnik attempted to take control of the small planet which appeared in the skies over the lake for a few days. She was Sonics biggest fan at the time, ever since he first put a stop to Dr. Robotnik's first scheme and was anxious to meet him, and she got to, at Never Lake. That was some adventure she remembered, she was captured by Dr. Robotnik and Sonic had ran across the small planet to rescue her and defeat Robotniks evil plan.

They had never gone out like a couple of teenage hedgehogs would, and if she didn't know better Amy would think that Sonic wasn't even interested in her. What was wrong with him? Whenever she went looking for him she always tried to look her best, made sure her red dress was spotless and her boots were clean, that her hair band was in her hair at just the right angle. But he didn't appreciate the effort of it at all!

She stood at a bridge over looking a river. The tide was coming in by the look of the water as all sorts of worthless trash like tree twigs and acorns and stuff floated further upstream. If only Sonic would come to her so easily.

Maybe Sonic just thought if he wanted someone then she'd have to be someone who could match his speed. But Amy was no runner and she didn't have a hope in heck of catching a super fast speedy hedgehog on her own two legs. Sonic always ran off to have these adventures battling that evil old scientist. It was an odd thought but for a moment she felt she was playing second fiddle to Robotnik, and if he wasn't battling Robotnits robots he was zooming around looking for Chaos Emeralds.

Okay it was important Robotnik never got his hands on the Chaos Emeralds, they were powerful after all. Seven fist sizes gems which contained power, so much power that when they are brought together they can cause great devastation if in the wrong hands. Thankfully Sonic always managed to collect all seven before Robotnik could use them.

It was always Sonic fighting Robotnik, Sonic looking for Chaos Emeralds before losing them and starting that quest all over again, or Sonic hanging out with his friend Tails the Fox. When was she going to get a turn with him?

Amy sighed again, it was back to a question of speed, if she could keep up with the speedy hedgehog then maybe she could join him on his adventures and they could be together, as a team, as boyfriend and girlfriend. But there was no way she was going to get what she wanted. She'll just have to go on with life at the normal pace of Amy Rose. She closed her eyes again and a tear came to her eye, the thought that she could never match Sonics speed and that meaning she could never have him really upset her.

She opened her eyes again and looked out onto the river as it wound its way down towards the sea, the moon was reflected in the water making the ripples and the flow of the river all the more obvious that it was high tide.

Something small began passing over the moon's reflection, it was much too large to be a twig or an acorn. It also looked like it was glinting in the moon light. What was that thing? A lump of driftwood? Whatever it was it began to glow a shade of green bright green and... Wait a minute? Glow? Green? Was that? No it couldn't could it? Was that a...?

"A Chaos Emerald?" she said excitedly "I found a Chaos Emerald!" she squealed. This had to be fate, destiny! If she could get it then it was one less for Sonic to find and maybe out of gratitude he'd go out with her. She ran along the road which rolled across the bridge and she gently went down the embankment. She stopped however when she came to the edge of the river. She didn't want to get her best dress wet and she didn't want to present Sonic with a Chaos Emerald looking like a drowned rat, what would he think of her then?

It was floating in the middle of the river, she just had to get to it somehow. It still glowed green as it followed the rivers current. She continued along the embankment trying to think of a way she could snag it and bring the emerald close to her, if she could hurry and get it then maybe she could present it to him tonight and they can still make the sunrise, if only the stupid Chaos Emerald would come closer to the bank. It was a Chaos Emerald wasn't it? Of course it was! What else glows like that? Whatever it was she'd better hurry up and catch it before someone else does.

* * *

**Authors notes:** I do realise Dr. Robotnic has been renamed Dr. Eggman in the games, but in my opinion 'Eggman' is the lamest name your enemy could have. Okay, it's supposed to be ridicules because Robotnic's often ridicules himself, but if he wants people to obey and respect him when he conquers the world then it's hard to see any menace or threat in an evil ruler who basically compares himself to an egg with legs. So for this story I'm calling him Robotnic.


	3. The Mask

**Updated 25/03/2011:** Corrected an error where I kept mis-spelling Robotnik as Robotnic.

* * *

**Act 1**

**Chapter 2**

**The Mask**

Robotnik rubbed his hands together gleefully. It was here somewhere, that massive power source and soon it would be his for the taking. Years he'd spent trying to collect all seven of the Chaos Emeralds to harness their power and every time he had been defeated by a little spiky blue hedgehog, causing them to scatter over the planet again and starting the hunt all over again.

The moustached scientist looked down at the controls of his hovercraft, in the dash was a screen hooked up to his computer at his main base. It showed the energy signature of that strange green, glowing object. Its power, oh such power. He'd never seen power on a scale like this before, it had at least over seven times the power of the combined Chaos Emeralds. He said 'at least' because the chart refused to go any further up the scale.

He was practically shaking with enthusiasm. With such power just think of the uses, he wouldn't need the Chaos Emeralds, Sonic with or without the Chaos Emeralds paled in comparison to this one object which descended from space.

His mind whirled through a list of possibilities of what it might be, an undiscovered radioactive element perhaps? Or an alien gem stone similar to the Chaos Emeralds? Could it be technological like a piece of alien technology? He rubbed his hands together again he couldn't wait for his robots to find it.

"Work harder" he commanded of his drones "Work faster! Find me that energy source!"

The drones roughly resembled slingshots only with arms, legs and a head, very weak looking and cheaply made machines but they weren't designed for battle like most of his other robots, they were designed for work like in this case they were scouring the area looking for an energy signal or anything unusual. Some were even digging with spades around the gash to make sure it didn't embed itself in the ground.

The search continued on land, but sooner or later they'd extend the search out to the sea. He wanted to wait though before moving out to sea. He didn't want to leave it to chance that that irritating little rodent Sonic would turn up and find it before him. He knew full well Sonic couldn't swim so there was no chance he'd go into the sea to look for it.

* * *

**Meanwhile half a mile away.**

A great blue blur signalled the arrival of that spiky blue rodent, Sonic the Hedgehog. He looked over the valley and could see the dozens of worker robots slaving away to Eggman Robotnik. It looked like they were looking for something, maybe it was that meteorite? If it was then Robotnik was way off looking over there because Sonic knew for a fact that it went into the sea, a place he personally would never go though if Robotnik was looking for it then Sonic might consider chancing it.

But was Robotnik really looking for that green orb? It made sense, most of Robotniks crazy schemes involved something of great power, mostly the Chaos Emeralds so whatever that green thing was he was sure if Robotnik wanted it then it probably wasn't anything good.

Nearby he found a large log of a fallen tree, long dead by the look of it. He walked over to it and sat down next to it, he leaned back against the wood and crossed his legs then raised his hands behind his head and waited. He might as well chill out until something happened over there.

* * *

Amy continued to chase after that floating Chaos Emerald, she didn't want to take her eyes off it in case she lost it but it just wouldn't come close enough to the bank for her to grab it and twice she nearly ended up in the river with it. How could she get it to come to her?

She looked ahead where she was going and almost ran straight into an overhanging branch of a bush. Irritated she stopped, took the branch in her hands and roughly snapped it off in irritation, she was about to throw the branch away but she paused when she realised that she could use it. The wooden pole had long branches sticking out at angles.

Great, it was perfect for her to manipulate that little emerald to come closer to the bank. She took off after the glowing object again at a run and held out the branch towards the emerald. However Amy found running with a long heavy stick in her hands proved to be a bit of a challenge because it threatened to tip her forwards. Instead she ran a little ways ahead of the glowing emerald, stopped and leaned over the edge of the bank with the pole in one hand. She dipped the branch into the river as the emerald moved closer and closer to it, but the branch wasn't long enough, it was just a little too short. Then in desperation Amy grabbed an overhanging tree branch and despite that it might give way under her weight she leant out over the water and prayed that it didn't snap. Tree branch in one hand, broken branch in the other she held the stick out into the water. The fruits of her effort paid off when the emerald was caught on her makeshift wooden pole.

Yes, she had it! She straightened herself up and gently pulled the branch and her prize out of the river, it looked like it had collected a lot of moss and seaweed or... some sort of plant had covered it but it proved useful because the extra gunk got stuck to the branch and made it act like a net, allowing her to scoop the gem out of the river and as she did it's serine glow slowly faded to nothing. Yes! She screamed inside her head as she reached out and grabbed the diamond shaped Chaos Emerald.

"What the...?" This didn't feel like a Chaos Emerald, it didn't even fell like an emerald or any type of stone. It was curved and rough to the touch she noticed as she detached it from the branch. It was covered in seaweed, probably indicating where this thing originally came from, brought up stream by the incoming tide. With growing curiosity she began pulling away and wiping the muck away from it. Her disappointment was founded, it wasn't a Chaos Emerald at all but her disappointment also gave way to a slight sense of curiosity.

It was a mask, an old looking wooden mask of some sort, _a worthless piece of rubbish in other words_ Amy thought. Usually she would've just thrown this piece of garbage back into the river as soon as she realised it wasn't a Chaos Emerald, but there was something curious about it, something which drew her close to it.

It was made of wood and was boat shaped with three holes in it for eyes and a mouth. The expression on its face was one of amusement, like the pictures of the masks in a theatre depicting laughter and sadness. This mask leant towards the laughter one though was not that amused, it was as if it was quietly enjoying some joke only 'it' could understand. Its eyes were round and wide and its mouth upturned into a slight smile. Running down the middle of its face between the eyes was a long metal bar which was held onto the main wooden face by four equally spaced metal rivets. The metal bar ran down to where the end of the nose would've been then stopped, like a type of helmet which had a similar metal bar running down the nose to protect it. The thing was also painted a dark shade of green but over the years the paint had peeled, and the thing had started to become mouldy and rusted, and her insides began to squirm when she realised it might contain wood worm.

She turned the strange thing over to look at the other side. There didn't appear to be anything strange about the inside at all, except that it looked much too small for her head, not that she wanted to try it on, why should she? It was the ugliest mask she had ever seen in her life and she didn't want this mouldy, damp, rotting piece of drift wood to spoiling her makeup.

This can't have been the glowing thing she was after. It was just a piece of green wood, there was nothing glow-y about it. She looked back into the river, unsure if she had fished the right object out of the river.

She turned back to look at the 'mistake' in her hands, that upturned smile on its face was starting to make her blood boil, as if the joke it was amused with was that she had spent all this effort to collect what she thought was a Chaos Emerald only to end up with this ugly looking booby prise, as if it wanted her to embarrass herself like this, as if it didn't want her to find a Chaos Emerald, as if this thing didn't want both her and Sonic to get together. Her blood was coming to a boil and she gripped the edges of this mask as if she could inflict some sort of pain on it for this cruel trick, she started to bend the thing in on itself determined to snap it clean in half. But she stopped trying to bend it and felt her anger drain away when she saw something she couldn't understand.

Something passed over the inside, a green and purple light, it was there for only a second but she could swear she saw it. She remained transfixed on the mask... 'the Mask' for some reason she instinctively knew this fact. She felt calm and serine when she had been angry and prepared to smash it to pieces not a moment ago and unlike a moment ago she had the strangest urge to put it on, but why... why did she want to put it on? It was much too small, but... she... did... she... she... she wanted to put it on.

She began moving the Mask closer to her face against her better judgment that it would smear her makeup. She could hear what sounded like a roar or a growl, a roar or a growl that was so silent it was almost unreal, as if it was in her mind. Her nose was about to touch the Mask when...

"YIKES!" she swung her arms out and pulled the Mask away from her as her foot slid on the slippery, muddy ground. The edge of the bank she was on wasn't very stable she decided as a chunk of what she was standing on fell away into the water with a splash. So with the Mask still clutched in her hand she climbed back up the bank and only when she reached the top did she regard her newest acquisition.

The thing looked really old, but wait, maybe that was a bonus! She thought. If it was old it might be worth something, it could be worth thousands, or more, millions! Think of what she could buy with that? Diamonds, jewels, a new dress! Maybe buy Sonic something he'd like then he'd love her. She was glad she didn't throw the Mask back now simply for the illusion of money, but deep down she sort of knew this thing probably wasn't worth the wood it was made out of but a girl could always dream and she didn't like it when her dreams were dashed. But all too soon reality came knocking at her door.

"Who am I kidding" she said out loud as she looked into the Mask's cheerful mischievous face, as if she was actually talking to it "I've tried presents, food, I've tried taking an interest in his hobbies, that hasn't worked either." Why was she talking to it?

It really was one ugly looking thing but maybe it might be worth something to someone. She decided to hold on to it for a while, she might not be able to buy diamonds or fancy stuff like that but she might get enough for something at least.

Funny though, as she looked at it she had the eerie feeling 'it' was looking back at her. She shook off that thought as she began walking again. She decided to go to the beach where she suggested she and Sonic watch the sunrise, maybe he would show up but she wasn't going to get her hopes up. Her arms slumped in misery as she walked, her right hand gripping that old wooden mask.

* * *

This was taking much too long, Robotnik decided. They'd been here for hours and all they had located was junk, rubbish, garbage, discarded plastic food packets, a few tin cans an old shoe, and a lot of dirt, but nothing which gave out this mysterious energy. He even sent out a group of Robots to comb the seas for any trace of this energy. They had been equipped with sensors designed to detect the energy signature this odd meteorite gave off, but still no luck, nothing. Where on earth did that stupid thing go?

He tensed up, the longer he waited the greater the chance that annoying hedgehog would arrive and swipe it from him. He couldn't afford delays, he must find that object.

"Dr. Robotnik!" said one of his worker robots, it was running towards him and sounded excited. These worker robots were basic exoskeletons with advanced hydraulics to allow the basic task of lifting and moving heavy objects so it was heavy and made heavy foot falls as it came up to him leaving deep footprints in the soft soil. "Dr. Robotnik, I have located something."

The robot's chest cavity opened up, two small panels flipped open revealing a bright, glowing blue, polished gemstone, like a diamond but fist sized and over a million times as valuable. It was a Chaos Emerald. Robotniks eyes lit up as they fell on it and his mouth dropped open. Maybe this little endeavour wasn't going to be such a waste of his time after all. His hands reached out to pluck the emerald from the robots chest cavity.

"Hey Ro-butt-nik!" came a familiar sounding voice, annoyingly confident and irritatingly smug. This could only be one person, one thing, that annoying blue hedgehog.

"Sonic!" he knew he'd show up at some point, he never failed to, but it was too much of a coincidence he showed up at the very moment he found a Chaos Emerald, he must've been spying on him while his robots worked.

"What scheme are you planning this time?" he was standing right next to him, that's how arrogantly confident he was. He was standing with one hand on the side of his hovercraft and his legs crossed each other leaned on it. He was also smiling as if he was in no danger at all.

"Can't a mad genius look for a fallen meteorite in peace?" Robotnik said placing his hands on his head as if he was having a migraine. "Robots, attack!" he bellowed.

Out of nowhere several robots suddenly appeared around both Robotnik and Sonic, these were one of his latest creations, they are called guard robots and unlike the worker robots these robots were built for battle, they were much sturdier and were much tougher than their worker counterparts and an assortment of hidden weapons which made them deadly. They held up their right arms as if to point at Sonic, then their fingers extended and curled back to reveal the business end of a laser pistol from the hallow of their arms.

In that instant Sonic leapt up onto Robotniks hover car and stood behind the fat scientists seat, all the robots compensated by re-aiming their weapons where Sonic was, standing directly behind Robotnik himself! The tip of their energy weapons started to glow as they warmed them up for rapid firing.

"Wait stop! Don't fire at me!" the energy weapons continued to power up but thankfully didn't fire. They were programmed not to hurt him, but he wasn't prepared to put that program to the test.

Two of the guard bots leapt behind his car and fired just as Robotnik felt a slight jarring as Sonic leapt off the back of his vehicle with an audible whoosh and somersaulted over his head and landed on the front of his hover vehicle. Then leapt forward at the worker robot who still had the Chaos Emerald in its open chest cavity.

On its programming the robot shut all its panels to prevent its cargo falling into enemy hands, but that didn't stop Sonic. He ploughed into the robot in an attempt to break the robot apart using his hard, thick skulled head! But Robotnik had made these robots too well, they were incredibly sturdy and though the worker drone lost an arm its solid torso was undamaged and its chest cavity un-breached meaning its cargo was safe.

As soon as he impacted the worker drone all the guard bots turned to exterminate the blue annoyance. They fired but Sonic leapt into the air avoiding the rain of red laser blasts which shot towards his direction.

Though Sonic avoided the blasts the worker drone was not so lucky, he caught all the blasts which effectively tore him apart and destroyed him. But the torso survived because it was made of tougher stuff then the limbs, so the Emerald was still safe inside it as it dropped to the floor.

Knowing that now wasn't the best time to race forward and scoop up or break the fallen torso, Sonic backed off and raced away as fast as his legs could carry him followed by a hail of laser blasts from the guard bots rapidly firing weapons.

Robotnik called over another worker drone to pick up the fallen robot torso, it was far too heavy for either Robotnik or Sonic to pick up so there was no danger that Sonic would scoop it up and carry it away but he didn't want to take the chance that Sonic would return and impact it with so much force that it cracked open like an egg.

He heard in the distance laser blasts as Sonic raced around trying to destroy his guard bots, but they were far more powerful than the usual robots he prepared. They were just as tough to destroy as the worker drones chest cavities. He was confident that finally at long last, Sonic the Hedgehog would die.

* * *

The gentle lapping of water against the beach seemed to have a very therapeutic quality to it Amy decided as she sat on the sand, legs bent, holding her face in her hands and looked out at where the sea vanished over the horizon. The sun would come up in a few hours and it looked like she was going to watch it by herself, again.

She sighed as she straightened her legs out and let her hands fall to the ground so she could lean back slightly. As her right hand lowered to the sand it brushed at the side of the mask she'd found in the river.

Her mind off Sonic for a moment she scooped up the lump of damp wood in her hands and held it out in front of her so she looked at its face. The thing looked far happy then she did right now.

"I suppose you didn't have guy troubles?" she said. What was she thinking? That was a stupid question "No you had girl troubles didn't you?" it really was one ugly looking thing, she repeated in her mind for the millionth time. She wondered briefly what on earth the mask was supposed to be of, when her thoughts predictably returned to the blue hedgehog "Do guys like you feel the same way about girls as I do about Sonic? What do you think?"

Predictably the thing didn't answer her; it just stared straight at her not even changing its annoying mischievous expression. What on earth was she doing? Why was she talking to it? She put it back down next to her in the sand again.

"I'm talking to a lump of wood" she said quietly to remind herself that it was lunacy to talk to a rotting lump. It was lunacy so why did she do it? She sighed, it was because of Sonic, she couldn't talk to anyone about him all her friends didn't understand her feelings for him and even if they did she would only see them as competition that needed to be beaten into submission. Was it any wonder she could only talk about Sonic to something which couldn't talk back or have any feelings for someone?

She closed her eyes to just listen to the gentle lapping of the water, hoping very optimistically that when she opened her eyes Sonic would be there to watch the sunrise with her, but of course he wasn't going to come, and he probably never would. She sighed again.

A slight noise caught her ears, it sounded like a low throaty growl.

"Huh? Is someone there?" she asked looking around. There it was again, a low throaty growl.

She suddenly felt very cold, was there some sort of wild animal out there? Behind the bushes or something ready to pounce on her? She quickly got to her feet and scooped up her mask in her hands. She looked left and right clutching the piece of wood to her chest as if it would offer some sort of protection against a giant beast.

She stood incredibly still looking into the darkness of the forest, the bushes and the trees beyond them, waiting for a sign, any sign that there was something in the darkness. The leaves on the trees rustled but only because of the gently breeze blowing onto them. Did she imagine it? Maybe she did. She knew it was crazy, she thought as she held the old mask out in front of her. But she could've sworn that the growl she heard came from this thing, or in its direction. It came from right next to her and close to the ground... so did that mean the creature that made it was underground or that it was very small? What was she thinking? _I must be going crazy!_ She thought again.

As she looked into the wooden mask she could only feel disappointment, _why am I still carrying you around with me?_ She thought _What was I thinking something like you could be worth anything! You're mouldy, you're damp and you reek of… of...Huh? _This wasn't right, she sniffed at it, that defiantly wasn't right, she took a deep breath of its scent. It smelt sweet like... roses? But that can't be this stupid thing could it? She moved the thing closer to her face and tried to take a better whiff of its odd scent when.

_Whoa!_ She pulled it away from her face quickly when she felt its edges buckle and collapse. It was as if the edges of the old mask had just tried to reach out and grab her head! It had just... warped its shape and then let out a loud howl of a beast as it did. It was now apparently back to its normal shape before it buckled but she was fast considering if the mask did make that odd growling noise earlier and a cold sense of dread came over her, what the heck had she picked up out of the river?

_Wait this is silly_ she tried to reason, _masks don't make noises like that, masks don't make noises, period. _But she was certain that it had just a moment ago warped its shape and tried to remould itself to fit her face.

Though her mind was clouded with doubt her green eyes remained transfixed on this odd thing, as if it was going to come to life and speak to her. But something much more unexpected happened. The interior wood grain of this mask started to glow a bright shade of green mixed with purple, it passed from one side to the other like waves over water and then it was gone.

Amy didn't know what was going on, she strangely felt calm and serene,_ Wow,… you… did… glow..._ her mind thought lazily as her arms began to buckle and slowly but surely she brought this odd mask closer and closer to her face. So didn't know why, either through curiosity or through stupidity or something else entirely, but it seemed she wanted to put it on, just for a second though. Her nose was just about to touch the surface of this green mask when...

Suddenly the edges warped and shot out like tentacles and tried to grab her face again, and this time they were successful in hanging on. This snapped her out of that daze she was currently having. What? What is going on?

She still had her hands on the mask and tried to pull it away immediately, but it wouldn't move more than an inch away from her face as its shape and texture started warping to such a degree that it behaved more like rubber then solid wood. Amy still had her hands on the Mask's edges and tried to fight it and pull it off but the thing had portions of itself wrapped over her ears and over the lower half of her cheeks and was clinging on like they were glued there. This thing felt like it was alive because as she tried to pull it away from her the Mask was trying to pull her towards it.

Her hands were beginning to shake with the strain, she didn't know what was going on but it was like a scene from a horror movie. She couldn't hold the thing at bay much longer! She lost her grip on the thing and it smacked her squarely on the face, she took a few steps back from the impact then she screamed as what felt like more long tentacles extend from the edges of the Mask and wrap around the back of her head and connected to each other encasing her head quicker then she could react.

She screamed at the top of her lungs when she felt pain in her head, this thing was trying to crush her skull by putting a tremendous amount of pressure on her head. She reached up and took the warping, wriggling mask in her hands and tried again to pull it off her face, but it wasn't budging an inch. She felt her heart start to beat faster and faster with fear. Her face then felt very warm and tingled like it had pins and needles as if the Mask was trying to worm its way into the pours on her face, and as she held it she could feel what felt like hairs starting to rapidly grow out of the thing, no not hairs proper quills, quills had starting to grow from the warping wood. The scene became even more freaky and disturbing when she realised she actually had feeling in this now rubbery mask and its quills it was producing as if they were coming to life and becoming a part of her! Finally she found her breath and screamed again.

"AHHHHhhhh! GET IT OFF, GET IT OFF, GET OFF, GET OFF, AHHH!" She screamed in rapid succession, but no one was coming to help her. No one knew she was here, not even Sonic.

What was this thing doing to her?

Her heart was rapidly beating in the chest and she was trembling in utter terror. Was this thing going to come off? Was it ever going to come off? Was she going to be stuck with it for a face for the rest of her life? She felt the crushing pain of it around her head again, was it going to kill her?

She suddenly felt incredibly cold but she also felt like she'd received a very powerful electric shock that made her body convulse and the entire area around her lit up in a bright flash and a loud thunder clap echoed around where she was. She heard birds and small animals in the forest close to the beach start to scuttle or fly away in their flocks as if they could sense the unnatural thing occurring close to their homes and ran away instead of coming to her aid.

She then felt warm, as her body started filling with some sort of power, from the tip of her toes to every last quill on her head she felt energy, raw power starting to course through her veins.

Finally as if someone else was pulling the strings on her body she twisted one way, but she fought against this rotation she tried so hard to fight against what was happening to her, she wasn't going to allow whatever was happening but as she fought against the rotation it was as if who or whatever was doing this to her had got cleaver and forced her body to twist the other way, the way she was resisting and this time she couldn't do anything to stop it.

Her legs and arms were locked into place as her entire body began spinning on her heels so fast that everything she saw before her past in an unrecognisable blur. She couldn't make anything out as she spun at this speed. Any pain and displeasure she had been feeling before this mask started wrapping itself over her face was rapidly dissolving and she felt her hair standing up to attention as if it was trying to pull itself from her head. She also felt sick to her stomach one minute but as the rotation continued and got faster and faster and faster that sickness in the pit of her stomach just ebbed away, until she felt fine.

She heard another loud thunder clap issue from her rotating form and though she had her eyes closed she still saw a bright light flash all around her. Her fear and dread then slowly ebbed away like rapidly melting ice when she felt energy rush up and down her body rapidly. She felt her spin cycle come to a rapid stop and everything seemed to return to normality.

The moment she stopped she was aware of one thing, she wasn't dizzy or disorientated or sick, she felt fine, in fact she felt better than fine, she felt absolutely fantastic!

"Wow! What happened? I feel... different!" she said to herself. She shook her head as if she had just had a very nasty, bad dream. But then she felt curious because the sand, the pebbles, everything light in weight on the beach had been moved, pushed away from her as if her quick rotation also caused quite a gust.

Shrugging, she reached up to feel that grabby mask on her face, but it didn't seem to be there. She could feel her own fingers through her face but oddly her face didn't feel... normal. It felt like it was made of cold rubber.

Curiously she held up a small handheld mirror up to her face. _Wait a minute, where the heck did this come from?_ She was sure she didn't have it a second ago, all she was wearing was a red dress and boots there wasn't exactly anywhere on her person she could carry something like this. Though her mind registered this oddity the rest of her didn't seem to care as she glanced into the small mirror.

"Oh, my goodness..." her eyes widened at the strange sight reflected in the mirror. Her face was green! Her facial skin had become a shade of lime green and her hair! It was the same style but it was a darker shade of green. What on earth was going on here? Her ears were also green but they didn't look like ears anymore, just large triangular pyramids sticking out of her head.

Did that mask do this to her? Was this green rubber thing she recognised as her face that same wooden Mask? All these questions raced through her head. After seeing all these changes she then decided to finish her sentence. "...this mask... has made me... absolutely... gorgeous!" she squealed.

Oddly she didn't feel mad, angry or enraged by these changes the Mask made to her, usually if one thing spoilt her image she'd go ballistic and throw a tantrum but for some odd reason she couldn't work out what she saw in the mirror actually pleased her. She smiled at the image in the mirror, and noticed her mouth contained a set of freakishly large, perfectly arranged, white teeth.

"Wow I've gone from pretty girl to goddess in just five seconds! Goes to show even I can make a catastrophically ugly mask look cute." As she smiled at her reflection and she heard a splintering crack, as the glass in the mirror fractured then suddenly, as if by some outside force it shattered outwards by itself, large mirror shards fell and landed point down in the sand. She regarded the now broken mirror only this time she sighed "**Every **bodies a critic!"

She opened her hand and let the broken mirror fall towards the sand. But as soon as it landed in the soft sand it slowly faded away as if it didn't really exist, in fact all those glass shards that exploded from the mirror had also vanished but for some reason she didn't seem to have the capacity to question any of these oddities in her current state.

Whatever this mask did to her she'd never felt so alive in her life, she felt like she could do anything, as if she had the power to do... to **be** it all. She felt so full of energy she was afraid that if she touched something it would burst into flames, that's how full of power she felt. It wasn't long though before her thoughts were rerouted back to her one obsession in life.

Where was Sonic? She had to see him, to show him the new her!

She took off at a run, she had to find him now!

She had only taken a few strides when she made herself come to a stop, her eyes wide and her mouth dropped open. This wasn't right, she thought, she'd just been standing on the beach but after that short run she was now deep, deep in the forest. She recognised the track she'd came along to get there because it split into a fork where she was now standing, but that wasn't possible. If she walked it she wouldn't have arrived here for at least five minutes yet she now managed it in a few seconds.

Though she had a fair idea what this meant she didn't want to get her hopes up. This needed a little more testing she decided. Okay she knew it took her another ten minutes to get out of the forest if she followed her usual path. She bent her left knee and let her other foot slide back and placed her hands on the floor in front of her, as if she was a sprinter about to break into a run.

_On your mark... get set..._she thought to herself. BANG! A gunshot had actually sounded from somewhere but she didn't have time to register the thought 'where had it come from' because she had already taken off at a run and boy what a run! The trees, the grass, everything on the track was racing past her at such a rate it was almost terrifying. She looked down at her legs, they were rotating so fast they were a pink and red whirl of motion and as she looked up at what was ahead she noticed she had already cleared the forest and was now running across a field. Is this how Sonic viewed everything? How could he cope with all this rushing past him? One slip up and he'd smack into a wall and kill himself.

_WAIT A MINUTE, HOLD YOUR HORSES! _She shouted at herself in her head and she dug her feet in until she came to rapid stop as if her feet had suddenly become stuck to the ground. A thought had just registered, nothing about how odd this was and nothing to do with removing the Mask after it had ruined her face. It was a thought about her favourite topic._ Am *I* now as fast as Sonic?_

She turned and looked back at the forest, the forest she had been in but a moment ago. It was almost ten miles away, she'd ran ten miles in a few seconds! She couldn't believe it, she just couldn't believe it. This mask not only made her mirror shattering gorgeous it also made her capable of Sonics super speed ability. She must be dreaming surely she thought. Well if she was, she didn't want to wake up from it anytime soon because there was no way Sonic could out run her now, she had him, after all these years she had him.

"YIPEEE!" she screamed as she twirled on her feet overjoyed that she had one of the things she'd always wanted in the whole world. Something she could use to get the one thing she wanted **most** in the whole world, but now all she had to do was find him.

She took off at a fast paced run, Sonic will be soooo impressed when he saw her she just knew it. All she had to do was find him and knowing that spiky blue hedgehog she knew exactly where to find Sonic and she just couldn't wait to show off her new powers to him.

* * *

**To be continued…**

* * *

**Authors notes:** I did think 'what was the cruelest thing I could do to start the story off?' and the solution was obvious, let Amy have the Mask first :D (Of course a much crueler thing for the characters would be if Robotnic got it before any of the others, but I don't wanna give you that, yet ;))

Since this is my first attempt at writing for Sonic the Hedgehog I'd like to know if I've got the characters right.

Cheers


	4. A Rose by any other name

**Act 1**

**Chapter 3**

**A Rose by any other name...**

Sonic had to admit Robotnik had actually created small robots that were actually a challenge to him. Only once had he created such a compact robot that was this much of a challenge but Sonic had still creamed it. Okay seven of them were more of a challenge but he liked a challenge.

He cleverly tried to get the robots to fire at each other by passing between them as their targeting system tracked and locked onto him. Though this worked it didn't cause the effect he wanted, the robots appeared to just resist these attacks by cease firing whenever they aimed at each other.

He then tried ramming one head on, sending himself into a rolling spin which usually allowed him to forge a path through pretty much anything. But the robot actually managed to grab him in both its hands as he spun around like a pin ball and threw him high into the air still rotating rapidly. All at once the robots aimed their guns at him and fired at him, there was no way he could avoid these all at once but tried his best forcing his body and limbs to twist and avoid all the laser blasts.

He was worried he didn't mind admitting, some of those laser blasts came close to his skin and he felt their heat as they passed by him but they never managed to score a direct hit. This spiky Hedgehog enjoyed moments like this the most because when he came out of these situations without a scratch he always felt a rush, the times when you feel the most alive to him was when you were just inches from death, some might think him crazy for liking this but he didn't care.

He landed on the ground perfectly and immediately broke into a run as more laser blasts attempted to turn him into Swiss cheese.

He decided against ramming these robots from the front and instead decided to repeat his last stunt, but from the back and this time instead of aiming for the torso he aimed for what is usually the weakest part of a robot, its head.

Sonic circled around and fast approached another of these tough robots but as it opened fire he side stepped, zoomed past it, impacted a large boulder which stood behind it on his feet, bent his legs a little and fired himself backwards in the direction of the robot before it could turn around. Sonic send himself into a rapid spin just before he impacted the robots head and with an almighty crack it broke clean off and landed in the mud.

Sonic somersaulted and landed back on the ground and the robot's headless body twitched and took a step forward but its actions were now uncoordinated as it decided if it could still function effectively without a head. Sonic didn't watch to find out because he had to take off at the last minute when more laser blasts tried to pummel where he was a moment ago.

He raced back towards where he knew a Chaos Emerald lay, in that robots damaged torso he tried to rip apart earlier. He blasted past several of these tough guard robots attempting to track him and ran at the box containing the Chaos Emerald. Why hadn't Robotnik tried to pick it up? He wondered as he reached out and took the metal box in his hands. But then came to a stop so rapidly it felt like his arms were going to be ripped off because the box was so heavy it refused to move.

His legs continued to run and his legs shot out while his gripping hands prevented his forward motion. He fell back and landed on the ground with a thud. He didn't expect the robots compartment to be so heavy and now that slight delay meant he was now surrounded by the rest of the guard robots and hovering above them Dr. Robotnik who looked down at him in triumph. That smug face was going to end up looking shocked because Sonic wasn't through with this yet.

He bent his legs and prepared to break into another fast run when something he didn't see slammed right into him and wrapped its arms around him in a great bear hug.

"Found you again!" that was Amy's voice, what was she doing? Couldn't she see this wasn't the time or place right now.

"Amy, not now!" he protested, had she gotten stronger in the last few hours? She was hugging him so tight it was really like being hugged by a strong bear. "This isn't the time for..." he caught sight of her face, it was green!

"Umm..." he murmured almost lost for words "what happened to your face?

* * *

What the heck? His robots were about to exterminate that annoying hedgehog when a great big pink blur came out of nowhere and slammed into him. A blur that turned out to be that stupid pike hedgehog, the one that always proudly proclaimed herself to be Sonics girlfriend. What was she doing here, right now? At this time when he was on the brink of finally ending the stupid hedgehog's life?

"Hey! Bug off" he screamed quickly standing up in his hovercrafts seat "we're busy!"

The pink hedgehog turned to regard Robotnik rather creepily, her eyes were annoyed but the look in them, that staring blank eyed anger look almost made her look like she was possessed but in character for this annoying little pink hedgehog.

"Why don't you... BUG OFF!"she screamed back at him. Robotnik jerked back and fell into his seat again because as she screamed the words 'bug off' to him her entire head had actually morphed and changed to resemble the head of a large insect with massive eyes, snapping mandibles and antennas. Then as if letting the air out a balloon the insect head deflated and reformed back into her original face, then she turned back to regard Sonic. How the heck had she just done that? And why... why was her face and hair green?

"What happened to you?" Robotnik said perplexed "Did you put your make up on in the dark?"

Another annoying look in her eyes and Amy turned back to Robotnik again and shouted "Hey this is a private moment!" before she raised one of her hands and... and pulled a couple of red curtains around them, curtains that were on a ring running around them held up by no visible means and completely blocked all sight of the two hedgehogs. Curtains that looked like they had just appeared from nowhere!

"Amy, no! Get off!" Robotnik heard Sonic cry out. What the heck was going on? The fat scientist didn't say another word he was too stunned by what had just occurred before him to say anything. Not only did she morph her head but she magically produced a pair of curtains, coupled with the fact that they were surrounded by robots pointing death rays at them and she just behaved like all this was normal. Didn't she realise he could have them both killed at the drop of a hat? How dare her not consider him a threat when he had all the trump cards!

"Grrr, its curtains for you two" the fat scientist growled. "Fire, fire, fire!" he bellowed and all the robots targeted the ring curtain and fired. One guard bot unloaded an entire rack of missiles from its back and fired them directly at the curtain, which erupted in an enormous explosion.

There was no way either Sonic or that annoying girl would survive that Robotnik thought, it wasn't how he imagined killing Sonic would be like though. He expected an epic fight to the death but at least he was a dea... He never finished that thought, because as the smoke from the blast cleared away he could see two shapes in the mist... this... this was impossible!

Standing where Amy and Sonic were just a moment ago were... Sonic and Amy, the girl hedgehog held tightly onto the blue one and both were frozen in mid kiss, the blue hedgehog by the way he was frozen looked like he was trying to pull himself away while the pink one was trying to draw him closer. They were covered in black soot but apart from that they looked fine. Sonic looked around, though his mouth was blocked by Amy's mouth his eyes told Robotnik that the annoying blue hedgehog couldn't understand why he wasn't dead either.

Amy's eyes however were just in mid shock, but not because she had survived it was because her kissing session with Sonic had been rudely interrupted.

"That's it!" she said as she let Sonic slip from her arms and drop to the ground. She turned to Robotnik those angry eyes of hers did unsettle him some and they had gone from an emerald green to a glowing scarlet red. She had her fingers clenched so tightly they were shaking and it looked like her nails would puncture her white gloves and draw blood from her palms. "You are dead lard butt!" she said, he sweet voice had become oddly deep and ghostly as if she was possessed.

She looked like she was about to leap at him and rip him limb from limb when Sonic was suddenly in front of her trying to convince her to back down.

"Whoa Amy, you can't fight those Robots they'll pulverise you!" but Amy didn't look like she was going to take no for an answer.

"Outta my way!" she said looking at Sonic as if he was an insignificant insect to be squashed. She grabbed him by the left shoulder with both hands and forced him into a rapid spin. Sonic was just a whirl of blue motion and by the look Robotnik managed to catch in his eyes Sonic was just as confused to what was going on as he was. The hedgehog spun like a top and appeared to have no control over his direction as he whirled around and passed all his guard bots without slamming into any of them. But Robotniks attention returned to Amy who was still looking at him with increasing hostility. Usually he didn't feel Amy was any kind of threat but now he had the uneasy feeling that if she wanted to she could rip him to shreds.

"Attack, attack, get her!" he commanded of his guard bots. They all grouped together and fired at Amy rapidly, she was surrounded by laser blasts which erupted into smoke as they impacted her short form. She soon vanished into the cloud of smoke and raining laser blasts and after half a minute Robotnik called for his robots to stop firing.

He grinned in victory there was no way she survived that it was impossible. But the smoke began to clear and Robotnik's jaw just fell. She was still alive? She just stood there and took all those laser blasts! What was even stranger was she had altered her attire, she was now wearing a swim suit and was leaning back on a leaning back chair like the ones you'd find around a pool in the tropics, a pair of sun glasses over her eyes, hands behind her head and a relaxed look about her. She looked like she was just out soaking up some sun on a clear day. Forget the questions like, 'how did she change her clothes so fast' and 'where had that deck chair come from' and all the other oddities, he was just amazed she was still alive.

"Nothing like a little sun to put some colour in your face" she said grinning though that green face. She slowly reached over to her sun glasses and gently lowered them from her eyes, which had returned to her natural shade of green and a wide toothy grin crossed her mouth. Even her teeth were unusual because they were twice as large as they should be! "Is it my turn yet?" she said almost mirroring the tone of voice of that arrogantly confident hedgehog.

She slowly got up from the deck chair, stretched her arms as if she'd woken up from a nap and completely unconcerned to the dangerous robots around her took her sun glasses off and gently laid them on the deck chair. Only then did she turn to face the wall of seven robots in front of her all with their laser blasters raised in attack position. She raised her hands behind her back and rapidly brought them forwards. She had somehow pulled a massive wooden mallet from behind her back and slammed it down on all the guard bots at once, the sound of twisting and buckling metal told him that all of them had just been smashed to smithereens by one hit from a massive mallet. Robotnik's jaw if it could dropped even further in shock, he could not work out how she pulled such a massive hammer from nowhere, okay she could usually pull out a smaller hammer which she used to smash things but this mallet was the size of a car, how could she even lift something like that with those small arms of hers?

She lifted the mallet again to reveal just squashed mangled metal underneath that was once his prized guard bots. Now she turned towards him her eyes full of malice and rage again. "Your move"

In a panic he did the only thing he could think of, call for reinforcements. He pressed a button on his vehicles console which called for one of his most powerful and massive robots but it was going to take time for it to arrive from his hidden base by the look of Amy it was going to take time he didn't have.

Thankfully, Sonic had somehow broken out of his mad spin and came to hold her back. Robotnik never thought he'd be happy to see Sonic at all in his life.

"Whoa, Amy what are you doing?" Sonic said standing in her way again.

"I'm going to make an omelette!" she said tapping the car sized mallet in her hands still looking at Robotnik with hostility "and you can't make an omelette without smashing a few Eggmen!" The welcome sound of an aeroplane jet engine began to fill the air while Sonic delayed Amy for just long enough.

A large red orb smashed into the soil just behind him, soil was kicked up into the air and rained down on all of them but Robotnik didn't care about that, his ultimate robot was here. With Amy and Sonic distracted by this arriving titanthe fat scientist bent over to the destroyed worker drones smashed chest cavity, and typed a code into a key pad under its smashed arms. The chest cavity opened revealing the glowing blue Chaos Emerald which he retrieved in the confusion and without a moment's hesitation he piloted his hover car towards the round red orb. The only thing it needed now was a Chaos Emerald to fully activate it.

A small circular opening appeared in the top of this red sphere and his hover car descended halfway into it. The sound of hydraulics clicking into place told him that his creation was coming to life and to supply it with enough power he placed the blue Chaos Emerald into a slot in the dash of his hover vehicle. It glowed brightly as the red sphere began to rise up out of the ground.

* * *

Four more openings appeared in the round ball and robotic arms and legs appeared from them as it raised itself into the air a good fifty feet tall. It was so large it cast a shadow over both of the hedgehogs. Sonic smiled, this would be a piece of cake but he hesitated for a moment, Amy was still in the way and stubbornly refusing to budge from where she was. She was in danger if she stayed here and though he was sick of her following him around he didn't want her to get hurt.

The giant robot raised one of its legs high into the air and let it hover over them for a second. Robotnik knew Sonic could avoid such a heavy foot fall especially if he paused like this, to him it was like hanging up a big neon sign which said 'look out, I'm about to stomp on you' but Sonic realised the foot was not meant for him but for Amy.

The foot was about to come down and moving quickly Sonic rushed forward to scoop Amy up into his arms and run away from this massive titan. But as soon as Sonic tried to scoop her up something that wasn't right happened. Amy vanished the instant he was about to scoop her up and he suddenly felt an arm around the back of his legs forcing him to fall backwards and land his neck onto another arm. He was now moving away from the robot at a speed he was usually capable of but his legs weren't touching the ground, so what gives?

His answer came when he looked away from his direction of motion and saw the green face of Amy smiling at him with a satisfied smile. She was carrying him in the same manner as he was about to carry her, he hoped no one was watching this, it was embarrassing.

Amy came to a stop and set him back down on the ground. He took a few steps away from her and looked at her in shock, she was now as fast as he was she was also able to change her clothes at will, a skill she then demonstrated as her swimsuit simply faded away and vanished to be immediately replaced by her usual red dress. Her expression then became stern as if she was talking to an unruly child.

"This is between me and Robotnik!" she said "So stay out of it!"

As if to top all the odd things that happened in the last few minutes this one was one of the top ten. Amy reached behind her back and somehow produced a large, solid box like cage or a prison with bars out of nowhere. There was a solid roof and no bottom to it, the reason for the bottomless prison became obvious when she slammed it down over him.

"Now just you play nice in there" she said leaning against the bars "Me and the good doctor have a few things to discuss" and with that Amy vanished and rushed back towards Dr. Robotnik. She was fast, just as fast as him now, he didn't know what terrified him more now, the fact that he was stuck here inside a small prison with no way out and an easy target for Robotnik, or the thought that Amy could now follow him wherever he went, and with these powers and her current state of mind that was terrifying.

* * *

Amy reappeared near Robotniks giant robot and yawned into her open hand and stretched out her arm.

"Now then, where were we?" she asked absentmindedly.

Robotnik's blood began to boil, she wasn't taking him seriously she was now worse than that stupid hedgehog at least he took him seriously in some sense but this girl hedgehog was regarding this whole situation like it was one big joke!

Robotnik slammed his hand down onto the controls and made his giant robot aim and point its giant laser cannon in its left arm directly at her. This laser could drill a hole in the surface of the moon, if this couldn't kill her... well it would kill her no doubt about that.

He grinned manically as the robot positioned itself up for an attack "Give me your best shot you green faced FREAK!" He soon realised calling her that had been a mistake.

"Freak?" Amy said weakly, her arms dropped to her sides and hung limply as she stared directly ahead as if she was concussed "Freak?" she said more of her usual self in there "Freak?" she said anger creeping in there "FREAK?" she screamed and to Robotniks horror her irises actually looked like they had burst into flames and her quills were now sticking up as what looked like a static charge ran straight through her from the top of her head down to her boots and back again.

Robotnik prepared to fire the weapon that would not only kill her but also destabilise the planets curst in this area for centuries to come, but that was a price that was worth paying to get rid of her. But just before he could press the fire button another odd thing happened.

Amy had somehow pulled a massive, giant cork from nowhere and jammed it straight into the mussel of the laser cannon. He could've laughed at such a pathetic attempt, a cork in the gun? Maybe that worked in a cartoon but not in the real world. Then as Robotnik pressed the trigger to fire the laser a warning light flashed and an alarm sounded around him warning of imminent failure, then it happened. Bang! The energy already stored in the cannon had to go somewhere and found its outlet firing backwards out of the cannon and up into the sky.

Bang! The entire sky was lit up with bright light as his laser blast hit something. A large object then rapidly fell from the sky, it burned in the atmosphere and came down to earth with a crash burying itself half in the soil. It was a satellite of some sort with a logo and words on the side, 'FOX NEWS' it said though he didn't understand what 'Fox News' was.

Amy shrugged as she looked at it "Oh well, that's no big loss."

Robotnik was both stunned and angry, stunned because his massive cannon had literally backfired just by jamming a massive cork into the mussel, something that was not just bending all sense of plausibility that she would carry around such a giant cork but it was also scientifically impossible for his cannon to backfire like that in the first place, it would've completely obliterated the cork as it fired but for some reason it didn't.

His stunned expression melted into manic anger again as he took the controls of his giant robot again "Grrr. Now you're going to get it!" he said as he raised the left giant robotic foot of his titan and prepared to slam it down on top of this annoying little speck at his feet.

It came down on top of her and she did nothing to resist it as she disappeared from view. Grinning madly he raise the foot again expecting to see a mushy bloody pulp of pink but instead he saw Amy completely intact and completely fine. "Boy you're heavy, have you tried weight watchers?" she quipped.

Robotnik's jaw dropped again for the millionth time this night and he felt cold with a certain sense of dread that he'd dealt more damaging moves to her then he'd ever done to Sonic and she was still standing!

He was getting sick of this and decided to end this once and for all, if he couldn't kill her at least he could get her out of his hair. Hands still on the controls he instructed the robot to raise its foot backwards as if it was about to kick out and made Amy the target ball it was going to kick.

"It's kick off time!" he said as the robot brought the leg forward with a quick whoosh of motion. But Amy had side stepped so quickly the fast foot had missed completely. She stood there watching him with some amusement on her face, she then held her hands up to her ears, extended her fingers and blew her tongue at him, a tongue that extended forwards a few feet and wriggled like a snake before it disappeared back into her mouth.

She was fast Robotnik had to admit almost as fast as that annoying blue hedgehog he didn't have to put up with two Sonics now did he? One male and one female?

As the kicking foot came back down to earth and though he knew it wouldn't work he set up the robot to repeat the same attack only with the other foot. But again this annoying little pink hedgehog avoided the attack as well.

Robotnik decided this was the best time to use tactics and strategy instead of brute force, and that manic grin returned as he set up the robot again to attack with a kick but just as Amy dodged to avoid it he instructed the one remaining good arm to come down and grab her, and It worked she'd fallen for it and the giant metal claw like fingers wrapped around her and brought her up to his level.

"My, my, my, what have you done to your nails" she said inspecting the robots fingers as if she was in no danger at all. "And look at this life line down here" she said inspecting a metallic fold in the robots palm "This lifeline is awfully short."

"I'll give you a short lifeline!" he raged as he instructed the robot to put pressure on Amy's little body and then another weird thing happened, as the robot depressed and crushed her body her head inflated to twice its normal size and her eyes began to pop out very cartoonishly but she still had signs of life in her.

"Grrr, why won't you die you little pipsqueak?" he ranted at her as he continued to instruct the robot claw to put pressure on her to stop her breathing. Robotnik smirked at this watching the tiny pink hedgehog slowly turn blue just like her hero but still she wouldn't kick the bucket.

"I appreciate the crush" her enlarged mouth said as it continued to balloon out from her squashed body "But I usually have to get to know someone really well before they become my main squeeeeeeze." She strained to say.

Amy then opened her mouth and sucked in a great deal of air from the surrounding area. It was like a gale force wind and Robotnik had to grab onto the control panel to prevent him from being pulled from his seat. When the gust stopped Amy closed her mouth then she reached up with one of her free hands and stuck her thumb into her mouth and she blew into it.

Logically this would do nothing in the real world, but as soon as she started blowing warning lights started flicking across the screen in Robotniks compartment. Danger signals telling him the pressure acting against the robots fingers was becoming far too great so much so the hydraulics were starting to fail and fall back as Amy's torso began to re-inflate.

Robotnik refused to let this freaky girl get the better of him and set the controls to put as much pressure on the little girl as possible but the pressure building inside her was pushing the large metal fingers back. It was ridicules but that's what was happening, the fingers couldn't take the pressure anymore, the hydraulics failed and were blasted apart as Amy's small body went bang taking out the entire arm of the robot.

Caught in the blast Robotnik had the giant robot took a few steps back to keep its balance, apart from the broken arms it was alright but where the heck did that little girl go though? She just went bang like a balloon.

"I think that's what you'd call 'armless" said the voice of the girl hedgehog who went bang. She was standing in front of the robot hands on her hips looking at the smoking stumps that used to be the robots arms.

"Why you little wise guy!" Robotnik cursed as he held his head he was getting a migraine over all this, why wouldn't she just die? "That's it! I didn't want to do this but get ready to get the full force of..." he paused as if to add extra impact to his next words "'...the Eggploder Cannon'" and with those words a cavity in the middle of the robots torso opened up revealing the mussel of a very large cannon, its tip began to glow a bright shade of green as it powered up.

While it was powering up however the annoying little girl reached behind her back and produced her red and yellow hammer and pointed the flat end at the robot. Robotnik chuckled darkly, sure she has all these freaky abilities but that stupid little hammer wouldn't harm this robot. "Give me your best shot, that hammer won't even scratch this robots metal work!" he bellowed a loud laugh as he looked at the cannons power readings, nearly ready and all this girl can think to do is hit the robot with a hammer. But what happened next Robotnik did not expect.

The flat side of the hammer opened up on hinges like a pair of doors and from it on an extending arm was a large boxing glove which extended with such force it struck the robot and pierced its armour though and though the glove exited through the back of the robot after crushing all the delicate electronics inside.

Robotnik felt the emergency evacuation system kick in and his hover car eject itself from its housing the moment it sensed danger ahead. The large scientist was forced into his chair as his vehicle shot into the air, beneath him he watched as his giant robot erupted in a cloud of fire and smoke. His vehicles engines kicked in and then, taking the controls he piloted his craft to take him as far away from this insane situation as possible and get back into the 'real' world as he heard whatever was left of his prized robot land in a scrap heap on the ground.

His hover car was unfortunately slow, too slow he realised as loony town caught up with him. Standing on his hover crafts hood was that green faced girl, how on earth had she gotten up here he didn't know or care all he knew was things were about to get bad.

In one swift movement he produced a laser pistol he saved for dire emergencies like this one and took aim of the girl. Suddenly though she started running before he could squeeze off a shot, however by running he didn't mean running away, she was running around his hovercraft but only from his point of view. Amy's rapid acceleration had forced Robotnik's hover car to start spinning end over end rapidly as Amy remained perfectly balanced on the top of the vehicle her rapidly rotating legs just making his vehicle rotate faster and faster. All he could see was ground, sky, ground, sky rapidly pass him. Rotating like this his hover cars engines couldn't produce enough force to keep him stable and prevent him from falling back to earth, he was going to crash and burn!

"Stop the ride, stop the ride" he screamed he felt sick, really sick he was going to throw up "I wanna get off!"

* * *

Sonic watched this unbelievable sight from his little prison as Amy sent Robotnik and his hover car into a rapid spin by running on its surface. Slowly Robotnik's car descended towards the ground but was fast picking up speed as it rotated faster and faster.

Amy then jumped off the top of the hover craft and landed on the ground before Robotnik did, if the obese scientist hit the ground at that sort of rotation and speed there was no doubt Robotnik would be killed instantly. But then Amy held out her other arm and produced a great big baseball bat out of nowhere at all. She cocked her arm and the bat back.

"Here's the pitch" she said and swung the bat, it easily made contact with the hover car sending it rocketing away into the distance and it vanished over the horizon in a matter of seconds.

With Robotnik gone Sonic suddenly realised that Amy would soon return for him, but he didn't plan on being in this cage when she remembered where she'd left him.

Sonic bent his feet, raised his hands and brought them down to send him into a rapid spin and tried to slam into the bars of his prison to break them down. Sparks erupted from the bars as his sharp quills began to saw into them. He came to a stop and landed back on his feat perfectly and observed his handy work and immediately felt crestfallen.

"Usually when I do that it leaves a hole" he said to no one in particular. The bars hadn't budged, they weren't even scratched it had been the same story the last five times he's tired to do it, what the heck were these bars made out of?

Sonic was then aware that a shadow had fallen over him, he gulped and swallowed as he turned around and saw Amy standing just on the other side of those bars looking at him wide eyed and smiling with a dreamy look in her eyes that Sonic could only guess was a look of lust.

"At last we're alone." She said lifting the cage off him with her one heave and tossing it over her shoulder as if it weighed nothing at all. Curiously as soon as it landed back on the ground with a thud the cage simply faded from view as if it never even existed. "So Sonic, What do you think of the new me?" she asked a hint of seduction creeping into her voice as she slowly came closer to him.

"Umm" he was lost for words, he'd seen many strange and weird things in his life but never so many in such rapid succession. "You're..." he stalled as he bent himself forward and dug his feet in getting ready for a quick getaway if the need arose "...greener then I remember"

"Do you prefer blue?" she said, and as soon as those words left her mouth her green head creepily turned a shade of dark blue, then slowly to a indigo colour "Or purple? What about red?"

"Umm" was all Sonic could say as confusion flooded his mind again as Amy's indigo head turned red.

"I can be whatever you want now!" Amy said as her head changed back to green again.

"What's happened to you? How come you have all these new… powers?"

"Oh these?" she asked smiling gleefully probably because he was taking an interest in her. "Do you like them? The powers?" Sonic didn't answer. Amy was alright the way she was and she could be annoying at times but right from the start he decided he wasn't a fan of this new version of Amy.

She looked completely normal except for that big green rubber mask that now covered her face, the quills and hair on her head which were now dyed a darker shade of green and her ears were covered in the green rubber making them look like a pair of pyramids sticking out of her head. She smiled at him showing those large white teeth. What the heck had caused this?

"By the way, Robotnik dropped this" Amy said as from behind her back she produced a glowing, perfectly cut gem which glowed a bright brilliant shade of blue, it was the Chaos Emerald he'd been fighting Robotnik over. She gently brought it closer towards him.

"Umm, thanks... I guess" he said as he reached out to take it from her but before he could even touch it Amy snatched it back away from him and held it high in the air out of his reach.

"Now, now Sonic, if you want it…" she reached up with her free hand and pulled open the front of her red dress and dropped the blue emerald down the opening before replacing the garment back in its proper place over it "… come and get it" she added seductively as a blue glow began to emanate from the front of her dress.

Amy wasn't acting her usual self Sonic decided, Amy was in love with him sure but he knew her and she'd never stoop so low to get him all to herself... would she?... would she? The more he asked himself that question the more uncertain he became of it and though he wanted the Chaos Emerald he didn't want to take it while Amy wasn't in her right mind, nor by the look of it, her right head.

"Umm, I think I'll let you hang on to it for a while" Sonic said as he tried to kick off and get as far away from her as he possibly could. It worked for a while, he rushed off in one direction any direction as long as it was away from her but after a few seconds he came to a total and complete stop because standing right in front of him, face smiling and eyes expectant was the green headed Amy again!

"Sun rise is in a few minutes, let's go watch it together!" she said

"Sorry, I've got an appointment with a doctor…" he lied

"Stop teasing me Sonic!" she giggled as she tried to launch herself at him and grab him like he was a stuffed animal but before she could close her arms around him he'd launched himself away from her.

"Wait! Wait for me!" but Sonic wasn't going to wait, he ran and ran and ran and ran until he was just short of breaking the sound barrier. Whatever's happened to her Tails will know how to reverse it Sonic decided, he'll have to go see him.

He saw something on the horizon, something that if he kept on his current course and speed he would hit if he had not realised what it was at the last minute and put his breaks on. He came to a screeching halt in front of Amy who had her arms crossed and a ticked off look in her eyes, how the heck was she doing this? She didn't even look tired.

"Sonic, I'm still your biggest fan and your girlfriend" She stated

"Do I get a say in this?" Sonic quickly cut across a little irritated, it was hard to believe but Amy was somehow managing to match his speed and more then that exceed it almost as if she was just vanishing in one place and reappearing in another place she knew he'd be.

"You can't run from me now" she said matter-of-factly

"I can try" Sonic said as he turned and ran off and this time Amy didn't make a grab for him as he sped away. He pushed himself and pushed until he was breaking the sound barrier and beyond.

Now we add another thing to the list of weird things to happen to Sonic tonight, because as he ran past hills, though forests and cities he was nearing music, music with a very odd sort of beat, music that didn't appear to have any source whatsoever yet he could hear it as clear as if he was right next to it. He was passing along the foot of a cliff when suddenly Amy appeared by his side and appeared to be hovering a few inches in mid air, a microphone in her hands, her eyes closed and she began to sing to him.

"I'm your biggest fan I'll follow you until you love me

Papa – paparazzi"

Sonic had never heard his song before but honestly that was the last thought on his mind as he stopped turned on a dime and started running back in the opposite direction. But just as he got up to speed Amy was back by his side again gently spinning on the tips of her boots which were just hovering above the ground.

"Baby there's no other superstar

you know that I'll be your

Papa – paparazzi"

She continued to sing at him. This was nuts! In the next moment the blue hedgehog came to a stop and let Amy shoot off in front of him. Then instead of changing direction Sonic bent his knees and with all his might fired himself into the air so he was running up the sheer cliff face but even here he heard Amy sing even though she was nowhere near him.

"Promise I'll be kind

but I won't stop until that boy is mine"

He came to the top of the cliff and slowed down so he could climb over and continue running forwards instead of wasting time landing then building up speed again, but as he came over and shot forward again in front of him was Amy now with her arms out stretched ready to grab him as he came towards her. Thinking fast Sonic kicked up and leapt over Amy as her pincer like arms tried to curl around him. He landed just behind her and took off as fast as he could again. Why could he still hear her singing? It was as if she was still here with him!

"Baby you'll be famous, chase you down until you love me

Papa-paparazzi"

Thankfully the music faded after that to be replaced by the simple noise of the air whistling in his ears and the soft impacts of his shoes on the ground as he ran. He felt his quills ripple in the air currents he was creating as he looked back over his shoulder.

"I think I lost her" he said out loud and probably too soon because as he looked back in front of him his heart did a double leap in his chest. While he was looking back he wasn't looking where he was going and right in front of him, almost within touching distance was Amy who stood there on the spot and Sonic was about to slam right into her.

"Huh?" Sonic said as this thought registered and when it finally had meaning he screamed "NO!"

He didn't have time to move out of the way or avoid her, he slammed directly into her and came to a complete stop like she was a brick wall. Vice like arms closed around him and prevented his retreat.

"Gotcha!" she said in triumph and hugged him squeezing his body next to hers so tightly he was having trouble breathing "You might want to hold on to something" she said and in the next instant the world was rotating around and around very, very fast like they were caught up in some kind of tornado of which he and Amy were the centre of. The next instant he felt them shoot in one particular direction and Sonic actually did find himself hanging on to Amy to stop himself being thrown out because if he tried to break out of this he didn't know what was waiting for him to slam into once he broke free. So instead he hung on and hoped Amy would come to her senses, but he doubted it.

* * *

Head spinning Dr. Ivo Robotnik regain consciousness and crawled from the wreckage of his hover craft, its round shape had protected its driver as it slammed into the ground with a great deal of force. The windscreen on it was cracked and its engines dead but at least the driver was still alive.

He stood up and slowly and gently swung on his heels from left to right in a daze "OOOOoooohhh" was all he could say as the world danced around him "I think she hit a home run." He managed to say before his dizziness caused him to collapse back to the solid ground and he knock himself unconscious again.

* * *

Sitting on the beach waiting the sun to come up Sonic thought slowly, if there was any doubt in his mind that this wasn't Amy at all then this put that doubt out because only Amy would want them to do this, sit here and wait for the sun to come up. He sat in his self proclaimed girlfriends arms which held him in a tight hug preventing his escape. He'd tried breaking it once they came out of that crazy tornado thing but he couldn't get them to budge an inch.

"Oh Sonic isn't this sooooo romantic?" Amy said but Sonic didn't answer, instead he answered that with another question.

"Umm Amy, what's with the green head?" he asked, he decided to throw caution to the wind and just ask her about it.

"Oh, this?" she asked rubbing the rubber mask on her face "just something I found floating in the river, but enough about that what about us?" she added her eyes becoming dreamy as she looked at him.

"Amy, what's happened, you've never acted like this before" he said as he tried to discreetly pull away from her, but wasn't getting very far. Looking into those green eyes of hers he was suddenly reminded of that funny green comet from earlier that night, did that have anything to do with this and her green head he wondered?

"Do you like it?" she asked gently pulling him in closer

"Amy, stop it" Sonic said as he began to increase his resistance to her closing arms. Suddenly Amy drew him unwillingly into a tight kiss that he did everything he could to fight against. They both fell over into the said with Sonic on his back, Amy refusing to break the embrace they were in.

"Amy, get off!" Sonic tried to say while she clamped her mouth to his. He had to shut his eyes not because he didn't want to look at Amy but because the sun was rising and the glare it made nearly blinded him.

As he sat there looking at nothing but the darkness of the inside of his own eyelids Sonic noticed something, or the lack of something. Amy and her tight embrace, that he was almost certain would fuse them together had slackened so he could breath normally now, and her lips had left his.

Curiously he slowly opened his eyes, Amy was still there but there was something wrong with her. She looked tired, her head was lolling from side to side as if she was in a trance, then she closed her eyes and fell forwards onto him unconscious. He caught her in his own arms as her form -that not so long ago was capable of holding him in a vice like embrace- went totally limp.

What had just happened? He wondered as he gently rolled Amy off him onto the soft sand and stood up. He picked up her left arm and felt at her wrist for a pulse, there was one so she was alive but unconscious. But he wondered what had caused this sudden change? From everything Sonic saw tonight Amy was unstoppable, she was stomped on by a giant robot, crushed like a squeeze toy in a giant robots fist, shot at, burnt, scenarios even he wouldn't have survived yet she did and completely unscathed so what on earth could've caused her to lose consciousness like this?

This would've been the best chance he had to make his escape he decided, but he didn't want to leave Amy in this form, who knew what she would do with these new abilities once she woke up and knowing her she'd gladly rip the planet in two to find him but he didn't want to remain trapped with her, especially this version of her either.

Maybe Tails could reverse whatever has happened to her and turn her back to normal but that would mean leaving her, he considered for a second and decided that if he was quick he could go get Tails and return before she woke up again.

He took a few steps away from her, held out his hands one way so when he brought them forward it'd give him enough momentum to shoot forward but before he could do this action something caught his eye.

It was Amy, her face was starting to glow a bright shade of green. The glow became brighter and brighter until Sonic had to shield his eyes from it but he squinted his eyes so he could still see what was happening.

It was as if Amy's face was melting, or the rubber mask was melting. There was a snap and a crack which ended in a very pathetic sounding hiss as the melting mask started to slowly become darker in colour, three long tentacles of the rubber material detached from behind Amy's head and began to retreat over her hair, past her ears and towards her face.

"What the...?" Sonic said as he watched Amy's face begin to swell upwards as if the reducing tentacles were adding themselves to her face and as they did the rubber became a very dark shade of green and started to get wrinkles and crevices in it, the rubbery substance began to look like aged wood and in the next few seconds that's what it had become. Something rose up in the middle of this aged wood between her eyes and started to turn dark, steel grey in colour.

As all this occurred a great gust was kicked up of which Amy appeared to be the centre of. Sand and small stones were all being blown away from her as the thing on her face became boat shaped as it rose itself from Amy's features and it rapidly reduced its size so its edges were sitting on Amy's cheeks.

The gust that was blowing from her in all directions died down and stopped and the odd looking lime green, rubber face Amy had been wearing had now turned into a very solid looking dark green, painted, wooden mask with a metal bar running halfway down the middle.

Sonic waited for a moment in case something else out of the ordinary was about to occur but after about twenty seconds when nothing else happened he stepped forward, reached out and gently lifted the wooden mask clear of Amy's face.

He looked at the Mask for a moment before looking back down at Amy, her face was now completely normal as it was before she became green, and she looked like she had fallen into a peaceful sleep.

Sonic returned his attention to this odd mask, this caused Amy's head to go green? If so then did it also give her all those weird powers and abilities? It was then he took notice of its expression, it was subtle but it looked like it was smiling at him as if he amused it. He turned it over and looked at the other side.

Did he just imagine all that? It all looked so unreal and looking back on it he was beginning to wonder if any of what just happened was real or was just a dream or something. As he breathed in an out he felt a slight pain where he was certain some bruises were going to show up sometime today from Amy's tight embrace, that pain made him certain all that happened tonight was real.

A soft moan caught his attention, Amy was waking up and before Amy opened her eyes Sonic hid the Mask feebly behind his back a nervous grin crossing his face.

Her eyes slowly open and her green irises looked directly at him, she blinked once or twice to allow her eyes to focus and she took a deep breath.

"Sonic?" she asked lazily as if she was imagining it "What... what are you doing here?" she asked just as lazily as if she was just waking up. She yawned and began to take her surroundings in and where she was "What are we doing here?" she asked as she yawned again and stretched her arms. "I've just had the best dream" she announced.

"Umm..." Sonic muttered, it looked like Amy was back to normal she wasn't coming at him trying to grab him, not yet at least "you must've fallen asleep on the beach, I came to see if you were alright." He lied.

"Oh, how nice of you Sonic" she said blushing as if this was an honour but then her face fell as she watched him "umm are you alright? You look a little flushed"

Sonic just stared at her for a second trying to see if there was any glimmer of that 'other' Amy inside her but as Amy got to her feet still waiting for an answer to her question he couldn't see any sign of the 'other' one.

"It's nothing" he lied and turned to leave, moving the Mask around in his hands to keep it from her line of sight. He was about to run away when he remembered something. He turned back to Amy being careful not to show her the Mask.

"By the way, can I have that Chaos Emerald?" he asked holding out his hand for it. Amy's face fell and looked at him confused.

"What? I don't have one" she said as she stood up straight rubbing her eyes. When she pulled her hands away she was aware of a fist sized bulge in the front of her dress that she looked at in confusion. Didn't she remember what happened last night? Sonic thought.

She opened the front of her dress and fished out the blue Chaos Emerald from where she had been hiding it and she looked at it as if she didn't understand how it got in there.

"Sonic..." she said blinking her mouth half open in confusion "… It was a dream wasn't it?"

"Yeah..." he said quickly as he reached out and took the Emerald from her hands "...it was, sorry I gotta jet!" and before Amy could protest he kicked off and ran away.

"Sonic wait up!" he heard Amy shout after him as he ran as fast as he could, he risked a look back and saw Amy running after him but she was rapidly shrinking away into the distance with the horizon, like she should. He breathed a sigh of relief, Amy was really back to normal.

He slowed down so he was travelling at one eighth his maximum speed, which was still quite fast but slow enough so he could look at the odd object he was now carrying. As he looked at the face of this wooden Mask only one thought crossed his mind.

"What the heck is this thing?"

* * *

**To Be Continued...**

* * *

**Authors notes:** Blimey, that was a long one wasn't it

For those who don't know, the Mask brings out the inner self of the wearer, gives it arms and legs and the god like powers to indulge its desires. In the case of Amy who is often prone to outbursts of great anger, jealously and frustration -that Sonic refuses to acknowledge her half the time- I reasoned it would create a character who defiantly would not take 'no' for an answer and who's anger would just keep building and building until it her actions go from general mischief to a fully blown violent and murderous fit though I didn't let her go that far.

The song 'Paparazzi' was originally written by Lady Gaga, no copyright infringement was intended and the lyrics were only used in humour.


	5. Tails the Fox

**Act 2**

**Chapter 4**

**Tails the Fox**

A pair of solid metal doors yawned open as Dr. Ivo Robotnik walked into the command centre of his secret base. He held an ice pack to his head which helped to cool the burning, raised lump on the top his head and he clenched his teeth when he felt it sting a little. He sighed as he sat down in a chair that creaked worryingly under his massive bulk and stared up at the large computer screen and control console in front of him.

After battling and losing to that freak girl with the green head who had also batted him across the valley at twice the speed of sound, crashing his hover craft and hitting his head while he was at it, Dr. Robotnik had to walk, yes walk, all the way back to his secret base because all the communications systems in his hovercraft had been damaged and were inoperable and the vehicle itself was beyond repair, so unable to call for a ride to get him back to base he had to suffer the long agonizing walk across country for the rest of the night and most of the day back towards his secret base. His legs were aching, his arms were aching and his head was aching all of which showed he was obviously not built for long distance walking. He leaned back in his chair and felt it creak under the stress of his massive bulk. Maybe that robot earlier last night had a point, maybe he had put on weight.

He couldn't understand it, how could fate deal him such a cruel blow? He'd found a Chaos Emerald and as soon as he'd found it he'd lost it to a little girl, that had to be an all time low in Robotniks book and he had suffered many all time lows in his time he admitted but that was the lowest, and worst of all he never found that mysterious energy signature he detected last night. His worker drones were still in the area would continue combing it without him until they find whatever it was but deep down he could taste the defeat that someone or something had gotten to that green meteor before he did.

Wait a minute, a green meteor? Something had suddenly clicked in his head, his brain which boasted an IQ of 300 had suddenly made a connection. That irritating little hedgehog's self proclaimed girlfriend Amy Rose had some freaky powers last night, like the ability to alter her physical shape, the ability to pull solid objects from nothing and move like lightning, but one of the most noticeable traits she had was she had a very freaky green rubber face on to go with those powers. Could the two possibly be connected? It was possible, and Robotnik thought so because it was too much of a coincidence that a green commit falls from the sky and then the pink hedgehog not only has powers even beyond what the Chaos Emeralds grant but her head was green.

That pink rodent obviously must've found the energy source before either Sonic or himself and that power has infected her like this, it was the only explanation that made sense. Still holding the ice pack to his head with one hand he reached up with his free hand and twirled his thick orange moustache which make it look more bristly as a victorious smile crawled across his face, if she had found that green meteor and was infected by it then all he had to do was track her down and take it the energy from her.

"Dispatch a spy bot!" he ordered suddenly at the computer "send it to the household of that blue rodents self proclaimed girlfriend, I wanna know every move she makes." He leaned back in his chair again and left the ice pack balanced on his head and pressed his fingers together in front of him "I smell something rotten going on here" he commented "I must know how she got those powers, and once I do I will extract them for my own evil genius purposes." As he said this he grinned and an evil looking glint entered his eye.

* * *

Sonic watched the odd mask with fascination as a red laser beam scanned over it from one side of it to the other, and it just stared back at them out through a glass panel of one of Tails' machines.

"I'm not saying you imagined it Sonic, I just find it hard to believe" said his best friend Miles Prower aka Tails the Fox. Tails was a little younger then Sonic and a little shorter, he was covered with yellow and white fur and as his name suggested he roughly resembled a fox with humanoid appendages, he also wore white gloves with red and white sneakers. This might seem unusual to a human but this wasn't so unusual to Sonic because after all he was a blue hedgehog standing on two legs wearing white gloves and sneakers, but the one unusual thing about Tails was, as his nickname suggested, his tails, the plural being the correct in this instants because Tails' tail had a twin.

The workshop itself was littered with dozens of small contraptions the function of which Sonic could only guess at, some looked advanced and very impressive while others look like a mixture of certain household items to create something new.

A bleeping noise came from the odd device the Mask was in, which looked to Sonic like a microwave in shape but it wasn't really a microwave. Tails described the machine as some kind of vacuumed, laser, analysis and chromatography thingamajig or something like that and no doubt did something complicated that Sonic wouldn't understand, but thankfully Tails described it in lay language as something that can analyse an object and discover what it is made out of, and it was currently scanning this odd mask. Several sheets of paper were ejected from a printer in its side, the paper had a series of graphs and tables on it that Sonic himself wouldn't have been able to make sense of even if he could see them. Tails scooped them up and quickly looked through them and the expression on Tails' face as he read them told him the results were going to be disappointing.

"Sorry Sonic" Tails said turning to look at him "but according to this your mask is nothing more than an inert lump of wood and metal, nothing special at all" but Sonic didn't buy it, he didn't care what that machine said he knew what he saw. He'd seen some pretty weird things in his life, gems that could empower a person who knew how to use them, a giant emerald that could make an island float in mid air, a creature made out of pure chaos, he'd been to parallel worlds and travelled back and forth in time, so on the weirdness scale this mask giving the wearer magic powers wasn't so farfetched as it sounded.

When Sonic had arrived at Tails' workshop he'd told him everything that happened last night from Robotniks discovery of the blue Chaos Emerald, which now lay on a nearby workbench, to the arrival of Amy with a big, green head. He described Amy's freaky new powers and detailed everything right up to the point where this thing detached from Amy's face and her powers vanished –though he did leave out some small details of what Amy tried to do to him while under some kind of influence.-

"I know what I saw Tails" Sonic said as he went up to the machine, popped open the glass panel of it which hissed as the pressure equalised, reached in and picked up the green mask and just looked into its eyes. "Amy defeated one of Robotniks giant robots as easily as swatting a fly, then a little later she fell unconscious and 'this' came off her face." he held up the Mask a little to emphasize the object he was referring to. He could tell Tails didn't know whether to believe him or not, but on the one side Sonics story was very odd but on the other hand Tails knew that Sonic would never lie about something like this.

Sonic turned the thing over so he faced the inside of it and gently began to lift it up to his face gradually slowing down as it got nearer. "There's one way to see what this thing does" he said. He noticed that Tails had taken a step back in case something did actually happen.

Sonics nose pressed against the cold wood and he closed his eyes expecting to feel his body become infused with some sort of power like he felt with a Chaos Emerald. But nothing happened as far as he could tell, the Mask remained solid and unchanged in his gloved hands and all he could sense was that, close up to his nose like this the thing smelled like it had been rotting in a swamp for centuries. He opened his eyes and peered through the small eye holes at Tails who's expression didn't have the slightest hint of either surprise, horror or panic. Nothing was happening.

"Umm..." Sonic muttered uncertain "Tails, do I look different?"

"Yeah" Tails said smiling "you look like a hedgehog wearing a mask that's several sizes too small for him"

"Very funny" Sonic said disappointed as he removed the thing from his face "I still know what I saw back there, Tails" he said looking back down at the Mask again.

"Are you sure it was this mask that caused Amy to gain these powers?" Tails asked

"I don't think it's a coincidence this mask appeared at the moment Amy lost her powers" Sonic said turning it over in his hands as if looking at it from a different angel might show something new.

"May I take a closer look?" Tails asked holding out his hands and Sonic gently tossed the thing over to him. The twin tailed fox caught it and turned it over in his own hands examining it closely "all I can think to do is do more tests on it." He said as he placed the thing on the wooden work bench with a clunk.

Was that thing only a one shot deal, Sonic wondered, like once used it can't be used again? Did it have to recharge or does it only come into play only if a set of conditions were correct? Sonic had a lot of ideas about it and no doubt Tails would have more. They had been on so many adventures together they had experience with odd things like this almost on a daily basis, if there was some weird riddle that needed solving then Tails was the fox to ask about it.

"Did you ask Amy where she found it?" Tails asked suddenly halting Sonics trail of thought.

"She said she found it in the river, I think" Sonic shrugged, Amy had been pretty vague about where she'd found the thing.

"I think maybe you should ask her" Tails said and Sonics eyes widened at this suggestion as if Tails had just sprouted twin heads to go with his twin tails. The hedgehog tried to hide his surprise at Tails' suggestion as the fox elaborated "We don't know exactly where this came from, and if it can do what you say it can then it could be dangerous."

"So you believe me now?" Sonic asked

"I never said I didn't" Tails stated "but like the Chaos Emeralds, we shouldn't risk the chance that there could be more of these masks around, and if there are we should make sure they don't end up in the wrong hands."

"And you think Amy might know if there are more of them?" Sonic asked again unconvinced Amy would know where more of them where, but also uncertain if he wanted to meet Amy again after her little 'episode' last night and though he tried to suppress it he would do anything else to put off another meeting between them. That wasn't to say he hated her though, in fact he found her obsession with him a little flattering, yet really weird and last night her obsession with him had reached new heights and had just been too much. But eventually he decided that Amy should be back to her normal self again, so he decided he should go and find out where she found the Mask and maybe he would find out what the heck it was, after all this was a mystery and his nose could smell the beginning of a brand new adventure.

* * *

Dr. Robotnik stroked his orange moustache as he gazed at the screen in front of him, on it was a picture of that irritating pink hedgehog Amy Rose but she was normal, or as normal as a pink hedgehog could get anyway. Her face was no longer the lime green he remembered so vividly and as far as he could tell she had no super powers whatsoever.

Robotniks mini spy drone had followed Amy around for most of the day, since she arrived at her home in fact and nothing extraordinary or out of the ordinary for her had happened. He was sure this was the first time he'd seen the inside of Amy's house and so far what he saw was so... so... sweet it was bordering on sickening. Most of the rooms in the house were pink and most of the pictures on the walls or on table surfaces featured Sonic, herself or both of them though the ones that featured both of them had Sonic trying to flee before the picture was taken.

He drummed his long fingers on the console in front of him and leaned against the arm of his chair in boredom. He was so sure she had some strange super powers last night, the destruction of all his robots was proof of that so why was she acting so 'normal' now? Did she really find that green meteor? Did she manage to tap into the power of the Chaos Emeralds? No, that wouldn't be right. Was this girl, Amy Rose really the person he saw trashing his robots last night? He was sure it was but the more he thought about last night's events the more like a dream they seemed, that was until he felt the sting of the lump on his head which reminded him of who real that dream had been.

Robotnik ruled out that Amy had somehow managed to use the Chaos Emeralds for one simple factor, when Sonic had the ability to utilise the combined Chaos Emeralds a transformation occurs were Sonic becomes faster and powerful and his entire body glows bright yellow with the power unleashed onto him. If the little pink rodent girlfriend of Sonic had used the Chaos Emeralds she would've been glowing a bright yellow and as far as he was aware the Emeralds didn't grant the user the power to pull massive solid objects from nowhere or change their clothes so fast or allow them to survive their bodies being twisted and mangled hideously out of shape then return to normal like a stretchy toy.

Amy entered another room and Robotniks drone slowly followed her. The drone had been cleverly disguised as a mouse, albeit a metal mouse but it was less conspicuous then a small robot and if she spotted it then she wouldn't even know it was him.

A ringing came over his computer speakers, someone was at the front door of Amy's house. Robotnik quickly took the controls and moved his spy drone under a nearby chair and out of sight as Amy came back into the room and walked towards the door. Robotnik let the spy drone peak its head out just enough for him to see who was at the door.

It was Sonic! What would he be doing here? As far as he was aware Sonic hadn't actively seek her out before unless it had something to do with those powers last night, well it could! He reached forward towards his control console and turned up the volume so he could hear what they were saying.

"Sonic!" she squealed and quickly flung her arms out then around him and weirdly Sonic made to run at first but appeared to be holding himself back allowing her to embrace him.

"Hi Amy" he said with uncertainty in his voice as he struggled a little as if to make sure he could break free when he wanted to.

"You've never come here to see me before" she squealed again. Robotnik turned the volume down a little, if she squealed like that again he was going to go deaf.

"Take it easy I can't breathe" the blue hedgehog said as the pink one released him and smiled sweetly at him.

"Do you want to come in, or go somewhere?" she asked fluttering her eye lashes.

"Ugh, we'll see" he said coolly "Amy I wanted to ask you about that thing you found in the river last night"

Amy looked heartbroken, deflated and irritated, her next words were spoken with greatly increasing annoyance. "You've come all the way here to ask me about that stupid, ugly ma**?"

A loud squeak had suddenly blared through all the speakers around Robotnik, what the heck was that? That wasn't Amy making that noise. Whatever it was it had been so loud he'd missed what the little pink hedgehog was trying to say.

"Yeah" Sonic said as if he hadn't noticed her annoyance "Where along the river did you find it?"

Amy looked like she was going to argue with him but whatever she said Robotnik didn't catch as another loud squeak blasted through his speakers again. What the heck was that? The picture was suddenly nudged to one side, then nudged again, what was doing that? With all this going on he was missing what Amy was saying to Sonic and vice versa and it could be something important. He took the controls and turned the spy drone around, and Robotnik jumped back in his seat when two large, black eyes stared down at the spy bot.

It was a mouse a real mouse and it squeaked loudly again at the spy drone and pushed it again with the tip of its nose.

"Shoo, shoo!" Robotnik screamed at the screen and waved his hand despite knowing the mouse couldn't see or hear him. He took the controls and moved the drone forwards and backwards to make it go away but the stupid thing just sat and, though Robotnik wasn't an expert on mice, he could tell it looked threaded. It opened its mouth and tried to bite down on the robot.

"Shoo, shoo, shoo!" he kept yelling at it moving the drone around to hopefully force it to retreat.

"AHHHH MICE!" came a loud scream over the speakers and Robotnik turned his spy drone in time to see that the drone had left its hiding space under the chair and was out in the open and standing over it, with a large red and yellow mallet held high was Amy preparing to smash the spy drone and the mouse assaulting it to bits.

Robotnik took the controls and the spy drone took off before the hammer slammed down where it had been not a second ago. Robotnik was in no danger himself, after all he was controlling this thing from miles away, but he didn't want the hedgehogs to know their conversation was being listened into. The drone took off as fast as it could around the house, if that stupid pink rodent managed to smash the spy drone she'd find out it was mechanical and would obviously guess where it had come from.

Sonic watched Amy chase the two mice around the room tipping things over and hammering away into the floor and missing every time. Sonic had always known Amy to have a very short fuse that would blow over little things like this and send her into a frenzy that would leave the room she was in half wrecked, he'd seen her act this way plenty of times before but this one time it conjured the image in his head of her wearing that ugly green mask and her chasing him all over the valley like last night.

The mice thing actually proved to be a great distraction for him to leave, he'd found out all he needed to know, if she complained later he'd just say she 'looked pretty busy at the time'. He heard something smash inside the house as he was walking away from it, whether Amy got the mice or not Sonic couldn't say because he'd already took off heading away from her house and towards where she had found the Mask. Amy had said she'd found it floating under a bridge close to where they last met, before her transformation.

It didn't take him long to reach his destination, a small bridge running over the river. He quickly ran down to the mouth of the river, then back up stream towards its source keeping an eye out for anything unusual like a cave, an open chest by the bank, something along those lines that could explain where that freaky Mask came from and give a clue as to if there were more like it.

But so far Sonic's searches had turned up nothing, just a few caves close to the rivers source but he checked those out quickly and didn't find anything. This was like looking for a needle in a haystack. If he wanted to find the exact area where this mask came from then he'd need the help of an expert treasure hunter.

Knuckles the Echidna immediately sprang to mind, another one of Sonic's friends, sort of. But would he be able to find where treasure came from rather than finding the treasure itself? He figured he had nothing to lose. Angel Island, where Knuckles lived was pretty far and he doubted he could get there before nightfall. Usually he would relish the challenge of racing against the planet to see who could get to the island first, nightfall or him, but there was one thing stopping him. Angel Island, as its name suggested, was an island, so it was surrounded by water and of course he couldn't swing. But there was more to Angel Island then that, the island was unusual because it floated in the air held up by the mysterious power of something called the Master Emerald. So in other words, not being able to swim coupled with his inability to fly disqualified him form this race to Angel Island.

To get there he'd first have to go back to Tails' workshop and they could fly to Angel Island in the Tornado, their single engine prop plane. He might as well go back there anyway to see what progress Tails had made examining that weird mask.

Again he took off at a run towards the setting sun and shielded his eyes from it. This day had gone by pretty fast he realised, quicker then he thought it would, it had only taken him a couple of hours to race up and down the river a couple of times now it was nearly dusk. Oh well, time flies when you're having fun.

* * *

_Just a couple more adjustments and it'll be finished_ Tails told himself as he worked on the odd contraption in front of him which resembled a psychologists couch with a hair driers dome over the top and a television screen on the back. He's been working on this odd contraption for a few weeks and now it was nearly finished.

The purpose of this device was basically to take the electrical synaptic impulses of the brain and convert those signals into electronic pictures, in other words it read the mind of whoever sat in that chair. Tails had no use for such a device but he just wanted to see if he could build one, because he had never tried to build one before.

The basic inspiration of this device came while he was reading a book on the brain and the mind with the intention of building a device that could translate languages, though this device could do that too the book gave him another idea. It detailed that a person's thoughts, both conscious and unconscious are divided into three types, the thoughts of the ego, superego and the ID, according to the book they were three different parts of the mind that most thought processes ran through before being acted on, and each area had its specific task.

The ID controlled the very basic, primitive instincts of a person, subconscious wants like food, water and... the need to procreate. The ego guides the ID's actions so they are socially acceptable and finds a realistic way of satisfying the ID's cravings, while the superego acts like the moral centre, interpreting the ego's ideas for obtaining the ID's needs into moral and amoral decisions, then it's up to the person to decided whether to obey them or not. It was very complicated but an easier way to look at it was to imagine you have three people inside your head, the ID saying 'I want this, NOW! And I don't care how I get it!' the ego then says 'No wait, let's think about how we can accomplish the need for real' and then the superego says 'Okay but only if it agrees with my morality.'

All these parts were separate but all were chatting away to each other in this gestalt to make up the full personality of a person. The invention would no doubt have uses in psychological science but Tails was building it just to see if he could, he'll leave the psychological discoveries to actual psychologists.

Now in a moment he'd find out if his work would bear fruit because the machine was almost finished. All it required was an energy source, and he had such an energy source, the Chaos Emerald Sonic brought along with that weird mask. With the right equipment a Chaos Emerald could be used to power machines, especially machines that required a lot of power.

It was thanks to the Chaos Emeralds that Tails could build bigger, even more complex machines. Before meeting Sonic and discovering the Chaos Emeralds all Tails' inventions were pretty small and simple robot type devices. Robot type devices that never last long not because they were badly made, far from it they could last for years, they didn't last long because the other kids he grew up with didn't understand his fascination with building machines.

It was a long time ago and yet it felt like no time at all, when he had very few friends and the only thing that kept him going was his drive to invent and create. But often while testing his devices outside a group of kids, much larger then he was, would come up to him, enquire about the device and of course Tails would oblige thinking they were taking an interest, but the moment his back was turned they'd break it and destroy it, all that hard work and they destroy it in seconds, then with the machine broken they turn their attention on him, the freak with two tails.

Tails' tails however granted him a very special ability if he span them around very, very fast they enabled him to fly like a helicopter and get away with nothing to show for his inventive efforts but a broken pile of scrap, self pity that the others didn't understand him and, deep down inside him anger that they callously made his life a misery just to add a few extra seconds of amusement to their day. He had more concern for the machines they destroyed but deep down, he hated them for it.

Coming back from his trip down memory lane, Tails picked up the blue gem stone from the bench and walked towards his newest device when something odd happened. The Chaos Emerald had started to glow bright blue on the inside, something that usually only happens when there was another Chaos Emerald nearby. Actually there was another Chaos Emerald nearby, in a special, secret safe to prevent Dr. Robotnik finding it. But the safe was shielded to prevent the Chaos Emeralds interacting with each other, so there must be a third close by.

It was then Tails noticed an eerie green glow coming from his work bench, a glow that was coming, not from a Chaos Emerald, but from that odd mask, it was glowing? He looked back at the Chaos Emerald, it was still glowing blue but only very softly. Making a connection Tails took a step back away from the Mask and the glow in both objects faded to nothing again. Tails then took a step forward and held out the Chaos Emerald closer to the lump of wood and it glowed an even brighter shade of green. Just to double check Tails took a step back again and the glow stopped.

The Mask and the Chaos Emerald were interacting with each other? How was that possible, the Mask was just a lump of wood wasn't it?

Tails set the blue gem down on his work bench and, his newest invention forgotten, he picked up the Mask and examined it again more closely. He'd told Sonic it was just a lump of wood and metal and all other tests he could think of doing just told him the same, an old wooden mask probably thousands of years old.

He'd have to get a more specific examination of what this thing was made out of, was it coated in some sort of phosphorescence or something? No that wouldn't explain why the Chaos Emerald appeared to interact with it. To find out he took it over to another work bench and picked up a small cutting tool, he intended to take a small sample to analyse on another one of his machines. The sample had to be small because the machine was finely tuned but... and this was even weirder, no matter how hard he tried to cut a small section off its edge the wood refused yield. He pressed down as hard as he could but it wasn't budging and when he removed the cutting tool there wasn't even a mark on the Mask!

Abandoning the simple tool Tails then picked up a very sophisticated device, it was a laser torch that could cut through pretty much anything. He powered it up and a red beam lanced out of it and hummed rhythmically as the blade pulsated. The Mask burned as the beam made contact with its edge but when Tails was satisfied he had his sample and turned the torch off again the Mask was undamaged, it wasn't even blackened or singed. What the heck was this thing made out of?

In one final attempt to see if he could inflict damage to it Tails picked up a very heavy hammer. It wasn't very subtle but so far this thing had stood up to the most advanced cutting devices he had and if this didn't even phase it then nothing would.

He swung the hammer down and it impacted the Mask. The bench and everything on it shoot, but the Mask was still undamaged, not even a dent in its wood structure or that metal nose thing it had. Tails decided to up the anti and swung the hammer behind his back before bringing it forward. The hammer made contact with the Mask, the bench shoot but what happened next Tails did not expect. The hammer suddenly felt like there was something pushing it back with the same force that Tails was putting behind it, this caught Tails unaware and couldn't stop the hammer flying out of his hands and smashing through the window behind him breaking the glass into dozens of tiny shards which rained down on the soil outside.

"Oh man" Tails moaned, looking at the glass left in the window frame continue to collapse and all outwards. He could replace that window no problem, he could build a couch that could read minds a window frame was no problem, but what concerned him was he'd probably have to work into the night fixing it because the sun was setting and just about to disappear over the horizon.

Tails turned back to the Mask, picked it up and turned it over in his hands, what the heck had Sonic found? He wondered. The only other objects able to withstand such a punishment were the Chaos Emeralds, but this was no Chaos Emerald. Could they be connected somehow, could it... Something caught his eye, in the interior of the Mask he saw a faint green and violet glow which passed from one side of the Mask over to the other so quickly had he blinked he would've missed it, but he had seen it and the effect was mesmerising. All questions Tails had about this Mask, all thoughts about it vanished, all the things before hand, the Chaos Emeralds, his new machine it didn't matter anymore, all he knew was he wanted to put the Mask on.

Gently, as if his arms had a will of their own, he brought the Mask up, closer and closer to his face. His nose was just about to make contact with the solid wood and when it did. Tails snapped out of the daze he was in when the solid Mask suddenly became more fluid and collapsed in on itself, forcing him to lose his grip on it but it didn't fall to the floor, it was still on his face and felt like it was trying to firmly attached itself to him!

All feeling was draining from his face as if he had pins and needles, and when Tails reached up to desperately remove the thing from his face he found he actually had feeling in the surface of this grabby mask and more then that it was spreading itself over his head like butter on toast and encased his head in its form.

His fingers dug into it and he tried to pull it off but the thing was wriggling like it was alive and he couldn't get a good grip on it. A thunder clap echoed around the room which was momentarily lit up be a bright white light which he appeared to be the source of and when it happened Tails saw in a polished and reflective piece of metal laying against the wall that his entire skeleton had, for a few seconds, lit up and appeared through his body.

Tails suddenly felt the sensation of being electrocuted, but the odd thing was it wasn't exactly unpleasant. His mind felt like it was being released, as if locks he didn't know he had were sliding back and doors were opening all over his mind.

The twin tailed fox then felt a whirl of wind suddenly kick up from his feet, raise up and swirl around him which such power it forced him into a very rapid rotating spin on his heels. His workshop flashed past him so fast everything blurred together.

In the end Tails decided not to fight this transformation, after all according to Sonic this thing would only give him the super abilities Sonic described of Amy while she wore it and she was fine, so surely it would do no harm to him and he was no threat to anyone with these powers because he wouldn't harm a fly.

Through the opening doors of his mind Tails heard a stray thought, a voice deep inside his head. It only said one thing, '_Guess again!'_

* * *

The sun had set as Sonic the Hedgehog raced through open country, he loved the country rather than cities because out here he could really open the taps and get up to some serious speed. Going through cities meant he had to slow down to avoid hitting anything or anyone but he never dipped below 124mph.

He came over a rise and there directly ahead of him was Tails' workshop, as he got closer Sonic took note of the broken window on one side, then he took note of a large flash and a bang coming from inside the workshop itself. A shadow was momentarily cast onto the interior wall through the broken window, it was a shadow with Tails' outline one that looked like it was fighting to get something off its head.

Sonic put on his breaks and came to a quick stop when he was almost blinded by a bright green light which just suddenly flared up from interior of the small structure, he shielded his eyes as he came to stop just outside the front door and could hear what sounded like a whirl wind blowing inside the workshop.

The hedgehog slowly approached the door but didn't get within 20 feet of it when it was suddenly blown off its hinges. Sonic ducked back as the door sailed over his head just missing him by inches and fell onto his back. He sat up and saw what had caused the door to blow off like that.

There was what looked like a miniature tornado whirling around and around, a yellow, white and green whirl of motion like a top, which didn't seem to be under any form of control. Great gusts of wind blew in all directions and Sonic had to dig his feet in to stop himself being thrown back by the pressure this thing was generating. Sonic heard a muffled scream coming from inside this twister and he had an idea what, or who this was but didn't get confirmation until the whirl of yellow, white and green came to a sudden stop with the sound of screeching car tyres and an individual stopped rotating at its core.

The creature that stood before him was a fox, but it wasn't Tails, or at least a Tails he recognise. This new fox was roughly the same height as Tails and sported the same twin tails as his friend, but his head and face fur was a shade of both lime and dark green. He was wearing a very dark jacket with grey coloured gloves. His eyes were also not like Tails', where as Tails' eyes were blue and made him look harmless and young, this foxes eyes were a dark shade of crimson and just looked 'bad' was the only way Sonic could describe it.

"Wowsers..." the fox said, he didn't even sound like Tails either "...what a rush!" and he smiled showing two rows of white, perfectly set, baseball card sized teeth which looked far too big for his jaws to handle and did nothing but to make his appearance all the more unusual.

This couldn't be Tails, could it?

* * *

**To be continued...**

* * *

**Authors notes:** Some say I put too much detail into my stories, but for a Mask story however I say some detail is essential to understand how the character thinks and to give enough background story to make what the Mask turns the character into all the more real.

The ID, ego and superego bit might seem random and out of the blue, but trust me it's going to be important ;)

**Edits:**

**17/04/2011:** Corrected a mistake where I wrote Robotniks IQ as 600 rather than 300

**19/04/2011:** Corrected a few character mistakes, spelling mistakes and altered Tails/Mask's appearance a little.

**20/04/2011:** Edited some of the detail on the ID, ego and superego. Some of the readers said the way I originally discribed it was a little confusing so I've edited it down so you get the basic idea of what the ID, ego and superego are. If you're still a little confused don't worry, there's going to be a more indepth description of it weaved into the flow of the story in later chapters.

Hope you enjoyed the new chapter.


	6. Tailspin' takes to the sky

**Act 2**

**Chapter 5**

'**Tailspin' takes to the Sky**

"Whoa!" was all Sonic could say as he gazed at his transformed friend, or he assumed it was his friend, it looked like Tails but in a more caricature way with green fur surrounding his head, large white teeth that looked too big to fit in his mouth and crimson eyes that were a little larger than normal, his head hair was also slightly longer and spiked up.

"Tails...?" Sonic asked "Is that you?"

The green headed fox smiled a smile so large it was bordering on creepy because his teeth looked like they were expending with the grin "You betcha!" he said winking at Sonic.

"Are you wearing that mask?" Sonic asked taking a step closer a little wary of the power in that Mask.

"In a way it feels like its wearing me" Tails tilted his head to one side and looked like he was sizing Sonic up as if to see how much of a threat he was, whether or not that's what he was doing Sonic couldn't tell because Tails wasn't exactly standing still, he was swaying a little on his feet as if he was dizzy or drunk and every now and then a muscle in his left cheek twitched like someone who's had way too much caffeine.

"Do you feel different?" Sonic asked cautiously.

"Different?" Tails asked casually but with an edge that made it sound like Sonic's question was a stupid one "I'm wearing a mask that's wrapped itself around my head, a mask that feels like it's giving me the entire power output of Station Square running through my head, a mask that feels tighter then Rogue's brassiere, so yeah of course I feel different!"

Okay, out of all weird, creepy and strange things Sonic had seen in his life this defiantly ranked in the top ten. This guy was Tails, the Hedgehog was sure of it, but he didn't act like Tails. He spoke with a much stronger voice that was full of confidence and his entire body language had changed becoming what was halfway drunk. If this was Tails it was a side of him Sonic had never seen before. What has that mask done to him?

"Tails, I think you should remove it" Sonic said focusing completely on the green headed fox to show he was very serious about it.

"Remove it?" Tails asked as if Sonic had just insulted him and for a few seconds Tails just stared back at him as if Sonic was a threat to his existence. The hedgehog took a step back because his instincts told him Tails was about to attack him and seeing as Tails was so whacked out right now he wasn't exactly sure if he would. But then the Fox's features relaxed and his mouth smiled.

"Okay Sonic" Tails said reaching behind his head "I'll remove the Mask" and with one great pull from the Fox's arms the Mask parted behind his head. The green rubber glowed a bright shade of green and streams of whirling wind wrapped around all his limbs as he tugged the green rubber free and it started to come away from his face, but its edges were still gripping the sides of his head and were stretching out his cheeks like they were made of elastic. The thing slowly hardened back to its cold dark wooden form the further away it got from his head and for a moment it had the same pained expression as on Tails' face before it finally let go and snapped back into its inert wooden form and the gusts of wind died down.

Tails, now back to his original form gasped as if he'd been held underwater for a few minutes.

"I'm sorry... Sonic" he panted, clutching his chest and gasping for breath "I don't know what came over me" and he handed the wooden thing back to Sonic who gently took it from him.

"Hey, no problem" Sonic grinned encouragingly as he held the Mask up again and... hang on there was something different about it now. Running down the bar in the middle of its face wasn't the usual line of rivets holding it on but letters, letters which spelt out a word, 'SUCKER!'

Sonic jolted his head back when the Mask's features suddenly moved as if it was alive, they smiled and grinned at him before blowing out a long, pink tongue at him spraying his face with spittle. He closed his eyes and tossed the thing down onto the ground and started wiping away the spittle on his head. "Yuck, that mask just blew a raspberry at me!"

The Mask now just lay on the ground in the dirt, the words 'SUKER!' still visible along its metal bar, the Hedgehog was starting to understand why it had that word on it as Tails took a few step towards the Mask but made no attempt to pick it up. He reached up to his furry whiskers and pulled, his head split apart and ripped into two revealing the green headed version of Tails underneath. He hadn't removed the Mask at all.

"GOTCHA!" Tails said as he suddenly burst out laughing as if that was the funniest thing he'd ever seen in his life. "You should've seen the look on your face!"

Sonic looked at his friend with growing annoyance. But what could he do? He didn't want to hurt Tails but on the other hand that Mask seemed to be controlling him somehow, governing his thoughts and motivations. If Tails wouldn't remove it himself, then Sonic would just have to take it by force.

Tails straightened himself up whipping tears away from his eyes still giggling to himself, while he laughed the fake mask had suddenly melted down into a pool of green sludge and wriggled along into Tails' left foot and appeared to merge back with it like a scene from that movie about a killer robot.

"I don't know what that thing's done to you Tails" Sonic said coolly as he adopting a stance ready to fight "but I'm going to reverse it."

Tails stopped giggling the moment Sonic finished his sentence, though Sonic was the fastest creature on the planet the green headed Tails didn't look the least bit threatened. Then the foxes frown broke into another creepy grin showing his large white teeth that Sonic noticed were so white they practically glowed. "Oh, you'll have to catch me first!"

"Gladly!" Sonic said and as if that was his queue to act he suddenly raced forward and tried to reach out and grab that green rubber mask. But in the next second Tails was gone, just blipped out of existence from in front of him, then in the next half a second later Sonic felt his left foot catch on something solid and he fell forwards into the dirt and skidded along on his stomach and face for a few seconds before coming to a stop.

Quickly he got up and turned around, Tails had sidestepped so fast that Sonic didn't notice it and at the same time the Fox had stuck his left leg out to trip him up. "Did you have a nice trip?"

Sonic didn't retort, part of his mind told him that was Tails in there and that he wasn't himself while the other half of the Hedgehog's mind was saying it definitely was not Tails anymore and he should full on attack him. "I really don't wanna hurt you Tails" the blue hedgehog warned "I know you're not yourself right now"

But Tails didn't seem interested in what Sonic had to say, instead he just closed his eyes and slowly walked towards a long stretch of dirt that served as a landing pad for the Tornado.

"Whatever!" Tails said before Sonic could finish what he was saying "Listen we can play later, I've gotta jet. I've got some 'depts.' and bruises to repay" he said as he cracked his knuckles.

The next moment Tails blasted off down the runway at quite a pace, he was halfway down it before Sonic could register the movement, but he didn't waste any more time as he took off after the green fox, his arms were pumping as hard as he could to get up to speed and catch him. Tails' tails were spinning so fast they were like a jet engine blowing him along, and blowing Sonic back but the blue speed demon continued to pile on the speed and was slowly catching up. It was odd, but the quick motion of his tails was actually making the same noise a jet engine makes before it takes off.

Suddenly Tails spun around and appeared to be floating in mid air still travelling at over a hundred miles an hour. Tails waved cheerily at him then stuck out his tongue, smiled and made a noise that sounded like 'meep meep!' before he turned away again and... this was insane! Tails' acceleration was incredible, he shot forward so fast the dirt runway actually bucked upwards in waves a few meters high like in a cartoon before they fell back down into place.

Sonic was thrown into the air by this bucking runway and had to put his breaks on when he landed because he'd lost all sense of balance and position. When he stopped all he could see was a long streak of green curving up into the sky and racing away at beyond supersonic speeds.

The speedy hedgehog wasted no time and took off again, with Tails travelling that fast there was no hope in heck Sonic could catch him up –that was a first- but Tails would stop at some point once he reached his destination and it would be then that Sonic would catch up.

This was like the hare and the tortoise story, only this time Sonic had the honour or humiliation of being the tortoise for once.

Based on Tails direction Sonic could guess where his possessed friend was going, the nearest city, Station Square.

* * *

Bored, was the only word Robotnik could describe his mood right now, bored, just plain bored. He had no ideas for world domination, he had no ideas for destroying Sonic and he'd wasted most of the day staring at the screen of his little spy-bot as it followed Amy around through the course of the day and so far all he'd managed to find out about the girl was she loved pink, shopping and Sonic, in that order, ascending order. She also sometimes spoke her thoughts out loud but they were useless to him as they were always about trivial stuff, Sonic being the special subject. But there was no sign of those mysterious powers or abilities.

Eventually he recalled the spy-bot, it had survived its ordeal with Amy who'd scored a direct hit on it earlier with her hammer when she was chasing it around but thankfully didn't destroy it. Thinking it was dead she'd dumped it outside in the trash and never noticed the thing was made of metal, she wasn't very observant. Though it had been clobbered its self repair system had restored its motor functions, it observed Amy for a little while longer before Robotnik decided it was pointless keeping her under observation.

Leaning his elbow against the console with the hand of that arm holding his head up he decided to activate some other spy-bots dotted around the globe, just to get a peak of anything odd going on in the world. Spy-bot alpha was at Angel Island and showed a picture of a tall stone structure surrounded by crumbling pillars from a long gone civilisation. At the top of this tall structure was a giant, glowing, green gem, about the size of a small car, the Master Emerald and standing in front of that was a lone figure who stood in the darkness his form silhouetted against the backdrop of the Master Emerald. Knuckles the Echidna didn't appear to be up to much either, just standing there in silence guarding that giant gem.

"Boring" Robotnik moaned as he tapped a key to switch views.

The screen switched to a view of Lava Ridge from spy-bot beta, nothing appeared to be going on there either. Spy-bot Gamma was supposed to show a view of Station Square, but that had been the spy-bot that had Amy under observation so there was nothing much to see there until it returned.

Spy-bot, theta showed a view of the mystic ruins, the location of Tails' workshop and... now this was interesting. He tapped on a key to get a close up of something that had just fired off into the sky leaving a long streak of green. The screen magnified over a hundred times and Robotnik could just make something out, a large whirl of motion as something receded away Tails' workshop well above supersonic speeds. That Twin Tailed Fox must be trying out a new invention, Robotnik guessed.

The large, moustached scientist drummed his fingers on the console for a second before he came to a decision. What was Tails was up to now, what invention had he come up with? Of course he, Dr. Ivo Robotnik could come up with something far superior to whatever Tails could build but out of all the people he had under observation Tails was the only one doing anything interesting, so Robotnik decided to send one of his other robots to investigate. It'd have to be a very fast and nimble one considering how Tails' new device was flying.

A grin crossed the scientists face as he began typing at his console, he had just the right choice in mind, it wasn't designed for espionage missions because its original purpose was to match up to and destroy Sonic, but it had failed time and again so an assignment like this would be its punishment.

The screen went black as a 3D green wired mesh outline of the robot in question came up on the screen and slowly rotated around. Robotnik typed in the new command and the coordinates to find Tails new invention and he pressed 'enter' into his keypad.

Many miles away hovering over the sea was the robot in question. It looked like Sonic the Hedgehog only it wasn't a living creature, it was all cold heartless machine, a perfectly constructed array of plastic wires, sophisticated electronics, advanced sensors and solid metal armour. Due to it being a metallic version of a familiar blue hedgehog the blue armoured machine had a very simple name that said everything about it. It was called Metal Sonic, and it changed its course and headed towards Station Square, where this new invention of Tails' would be, to observe and possibly destroy if he felt like it.

* * *

_Something strange is happening in Station Square, something wicked, something weird, something out of this world. _"and I should know! I'm doing it!" Tails said out loud to this odd thought in his mind.

He'd landed on a roof top of a massive sky scraper, the tallest one in Station Square in fact and was observing the entire city around him with a long telescope he'd just somehow magically manage to pull out of thin air, he just wanted it and there it was in his hand.

This Mask was beyond weird, it was too weird for words, so he'll just keep most of it to himself. But basically it felt like it was playing Ping-Pong with his mind which felt like it was pumped full of energy, so full of energy it felt like his brain was overloading. He couldn't think straight, in fact he could barely think, at least not about what he was intending to do, every time he was about to have a thought relating to what the heck was going on it was pushed out of the way before it manifested itself. His mind felt free, '_free like a bird in a tree' _but only because it felt like there was no longer anything holding him back, there was nothing to say 'stop what you're doing, just think about what you're about to do!' that part was gone, leaving Tails' mind free... and he liked it.

Unlocking his mind had also unlocked long forgotten memories, all those bullies he once had as a kid, the ones that picked on him, destroying his inventions, trying to tie his tails in two. All of those memories just bubbled up to the surface, and they angered him, he felt anger like he'd never felt it before and he wanted... he wanted... he wanted... revenge!

Tails leapt over the edge of the tall skyscraper and just let himself gradually fall to the ground, he did not concern himself with what would happen when he hit the ground at terminal velocity he just didn't seem to have the capacity to worry about that anymore. He waited until the last minute before allowing his tails to spin around really fast and slow him down just before he landed preventing him from became a green smear on the road surface.

He stepped onto the solid ground and looked around, he had gathered quite a few odd looks from a couple of on lookers walking the streets, probably because his face and body was twitching like he'd drunk too much coffee, or it could be the freaky mask he was wearing but Tails couldn't care less about what they thought, all he cared about was repaying a few lumps he had, both physical and psychological lumps, and he was going to go Terminator on their butts!

Not knowing where to begin looking for his quarry he approached a telephone booth, and flung open the door before walking inside and pulling on the telephone directory so hard it actually snapped the piece of rope holding it in place.

Quickly flipping through the book he found a couple of names he was looking for, Carlos the Armadillo, Drake the Duck and Terry the Turtle were just three of the names he found in the directory currently living in Station Square. Perfect!

Tails dropped the book to the floor, pulled open the telephone booth again and began gradually walking down the street attracting many looks from people with his massive green head and large white teeth as he sang "Don't... stop... thinking about tomorrow, don't stop..."

* * *

**To Be Continued...**

* * *

**Authors notes: **Tails' Mask persona might seem a little extreme and way out of character for Tails but that's something I like about the Mask. Both in the film and the comic its shown to turn a mild mannered, kind, sweet and gentle person into their polar opposite. So given that Tails was constantly bullied before meeting Sonic the memories of those events would really affect his judgement while in the Mask.

The names of Tails' bullies are characters I intend to create specially for this story, the names Carlos the Armadillo, Drake the Duck and Terry the Turtle.

Also feel free to tell me your opinion of Tails/Mask

Hope you enjoyed the new chapter


	7. Phantasmagoria

**Act 2**

**Chapter 6**

**Phantasmagoria**

Carlos turned the keys in the ignition and the engine purred into life. He revved it and he could just feel the power of his motorbike, this thing is going to sound great when he goes through a tunnel. Its chrome pipes also glinted and shone in the garage light making it a thing of beauty.

"Sweet" Terry said as he leaned against the wall his dark shades hiding his eyes. Carlos would've thought a turtle standing on its back legs and wearing sun glasses was unusual had he himself not been an Armadillo walking upright on its own back legs.

"It better be. I spent all day tuning up this baby" Carlos said patting the body of the bike as he got off it.

"Yeah, but I think the exhaust needs adjusting, it's got some mad rattle." Drake said.

"Impossible, I spent all day tuning it up!" Carlos said incredulously.

"I was talking about your mouth" Drake grinned.

"Shut up" If there was any such thing as a mean looking duck then Drake was the picture of it and he managed to pull it off very well. If you've ever had a duck chase after you from a pond, then that was the sort of image Drake had about him, a mad duck.

Slowly Carlos walked towards a shelf which had dozens of tools laid out on it specifically used to tune up their bikes and replaced a spanner he held idly in his hand back on the shelf. His eyes were drawn onto the far side of the shelf which sat a funny looking mouse thing that was actually made of metal except it had a large crack in its back and wires and springs sticking out through it. That pipsqueak had said it was fragile.

That metal mouse was some worthless piece of junk he'd 'borrowed' from a geeky fox years ago. It was cracked because after they 'borrowed' it they suddenly realised they wanted to play baseball but then realised there was no ball, they had that thing that looked ball shape if you squinted your eyes a little so they used that.

'Tailend', as they called him was almost on the point of tears when they destroyed it, and he was probably even more upset when they decided for him that he didn't want it back because it was broken. Ah, good times.

"Hey, Carlos your exhaust is rattling again" said Drake again.

"Shut up" Carlos said, why was the stupid duck making that stupid joke again?

"No, it really is rattling" Drake insisted. Carlos turned to look at his bikes exhaust and it was rattling very badly, which was odd because the engine was off.

"What did you do?" Carlos shouted as he ran to his babies' aid. Suddenly with the sound of a cannon firing off something shot out of the end of the exhaust and Carlos caught it right in the stomach knocking the wind out of him and forcing him to fall over and roll back onto his shell.

When he came to his senses he could see clearly what had just shot into his stomach from the narrow exhaust. It was... was he concussed or something? Because it was a fox in a green rubber mask covered in fake looking green fur and almost creepy, large, red eyes. The fox coughed into his hand as a dust cloud of soot cleared around them. The fox swung a brush over his shoulder, it looked like the sort you'd use to clean chimneys with.

"Alright Governor!" the fox said in a very thick and not very convincing cockney accent "Blimey, it was dusty up there, that's gonna cost you."

"What the... GET OFF ME!" the Armadillo shouted pushing the freaky looking fox off him and he got to his feet.

The fox carefully got to his own feet and began to gently and coolly brush himself down because he was covered in black soot.

"Who are you, what are you doing here?" the Armadillo said coming closer to the fox. But then the fox sped away very quickly and stood perfectly balanced on the seat of his bike. All the soot was now gone he was completely clean and his accent changed to what sounded like someone making a sales pitch.

"Let me ask you guys, have you ever been injured in a trip or fall?" Perplexed Carlos turned to Drake and Terry who just shrugged. The fox was imitating an advert about claiming from injuries and accident at work, he was obviously a nut case and Carlos turned back to the fox who continued his pitch.

"Well..." He reached into his jacket pockets and pulled out a long pair wooden poles that were far too long to fit into his pockets, and when they finally popped out they had a large, dull grey hammer attachment on one pole and a large axe on the other. "...would you 'like' to be injured in a trip or fall?" the fox grinned madly "Because I can only be too glad to oblige!"

"Holy crud, I must be seeing things!" Drake said rubbing his eyes with his wings and blinking a few times, this was obviously some sort of illusion. Then in the blink of an eye the fox had come to stand right next to Drake with his arm over the ducks shoulders.

"Really?" the fox said to Drake's last statement and titling his head to one side "I have a cure for that. How many fingers?" the fox said holding up his hand and raising two fingers. A little perplexed Drake answered. "Two"

"That's right!" the fox said dropping the fingers so they were level and pointing directly at Drakes eyes, which was exactly where they were heading. Drake jerked back and felt his eyes in pain as the fox pushed his fingers onto Drakes eyes and quickly withdrew them. "You see anything now?" the fox laughed.

Behind the fox Terry was slowly advancing on the nutty kid and spread his arms preparing to grab him. Very quickly however the fox spun around and pointed the flat end of the hammer that was still in his hand at the turtle as he prepared to pounce. Before that could happen something unexpected happened first. The front of the hammer sprung open like it had a pair of double doors on it and from its hollow insides extended a long boxing glove which smacked into the turtles stomach and sent him flying back into the wall with a bang.

"Wait your turn" the fox said spinning back to Carlos who was just about to grab him himself, but as his arms closed around the fox he vanished, just vanished!

A spike of pain ran from his tail up his back as someone pulled on his tail and pulled it upwards forcing him off his feet to hang upside down from the ceiling. He looked at his tail and saw the freak of a fox tying his it into a knot from an overhead pipe.

"Question time!" the fox announced looking down at Carlos from the pipe "If you stretched an armadillos tail out and tied it in a knot from a pipe, how angry would he be?" the fox laughed, leapt and landed back on the floor. "It's not nice to tie a tail or two into a knot is it?"

Drake was sneaking up on the fox with the intent of smacking him over the head with a heavy looking hammer, and he did. The hammer sharply impacted the fox's head and... small birds erupted from the kids head and started flying around his crown like in a cartoon and his eyes began to roll over and over in his head.

"Ow" he muttered "Now that was odd, do you know what was odd? I'll tell you!" he said rapidly as his head slowly and creepily turned to look at Drake "I didn't feel a thing!" and with that said the fox reverse kicked the duck in the stomach, and turned his attention back to Carlos. The fox came to stand next to him before turning back to Drake and Terry holding his hands out towards Carlos's inverted form.

"Now here we have the armadillo in its natural habitat..." the fox said in a very educated sounding accent of someone hosting a nature TV show. "...as we can see it has a soft underbelly" the fox said sharply kicking the armadillo in the stomach knocking the wind out of him and sending him into a spin for a brief moment before he stopped facing away from the fox. "...and has evolved an armoured shell to protect its back" the fox gently knocked on the shell "which is resistant against any attack as I shall demonstrate!" Carlos turned his head just enough to see the fox holding a very sturdy looking baseball bat and with a powerful swing smacked it into his back.

Carlos however didn't feel anything as the bat shattered into a million pieces upon impact leaving him unharmed. This didn't reassure Carlos however, because in his position he couldn't roll into a ball to protect all of him.

"But let's reverse evolution a few thousand years!" the fox said as he grabbed Carlo's shell and did something Carlos thought impossible. He managed to remove the shell from his back as if it was just an item of clothing, the action was painless and Carlos now felt very cold and vulnerable. The fox tossed the shell away into the corner of the room like it was a piece of junk.

"Now here we have the ancestor of the armadillo, the 'illo' without the protective shell. Now..." though Carlos couldn't see it he imagined the fox was grinning like a loon again "...let's run that test again!" the fox said now holding another bat in his hand, where the heck was he getting all these tools? He cocked his arm back ready to swing it into the 'Illos' back, Carlos closed his eyes and waited for the impact. But it never came.

He heard what sounded like a bat clattering onto the floor. He opened his eyes and he could see Terry the Turtle standing where the fox was just a second ago and was standing in a way to suggest he'd just rammed into the fox, which was true because the fox shot past his face very quickly and uncontrollably impacted the shelf with all their tools on it which began to creak very worryingly.

Slowly the tall shelf started to fall forwards and was going to land on top of the fox. The green rodent got to his feet not noticing the danger and when he did it was too late. The shelf landed on him with a bang and a loud clattering of tools. The only indication that someone was under it was the guys left arm which looked like it was withering in agony before falling still and... started drummed its fingers on the floor as if it was trying to work something out.

The arm placed its hand on the shelf and pushed it upwards a little. At first Carlos thought the fox had vanished because apart from a few scattered tools it looked like the green fox had just disappeared probably luckily though a hole in the floor, but no, he couldn't see a hole in the floor the fox was gone, but then where was that arm coming from? Looking closely where the arm was it appeared to just sprout out of the ground and... now Carlos could now see the fox clearly, and his eyes widened and his mouth opened a little in shock. The kid had been crushed into the floor flatter then a pan cake, and he was still alive!

Sharply the fox pushed the shelf off himself with such force it flew back and righted itself against the wall letting Carlos, Drake and Terry see that the fox was squashed into the floor like in a cartoon. The hand reached back and grabbed a lock of fur from his head and pulled. His face quickly peeled off the floor but his eyes stayed stuck onto the concrete momentarily as his face left the floor, they were attached to his head only by long, white stalks which were quickly put under tension forcing his eyes to peel off and snap back into his eye sockets.

"Sometimes, you guys really leave me flat!" Quickly the fox peeled himself completely off the floor and just stood there standing on his flat feet looking down at himself as if he'd never seen anything like this before. "Hmm. That's interesting" the fox said checking out his normal arm and comparing it to his flattened arm.

He shook his normal hand and something dropped from his sleeve on a string. From Carlos' upside down position he could clearly see it said 'Pull to inflate' and the fox did pull on it with his flat hand. There was a ping followed by a hissing noise, and in the next moment the fox's body practically exploded outwards and ballooned out like he was an inflatable animal before his form settled back down into his normal self.

"What the heck are you?" Drake shouted at him struggling to get down from the ceiling and get away from this lunatic. The fox glared at him with dislike as his tail raised upwards in annoyance, no not tail, 'tails'. Carlos just realised the fox had two tails.

Terry, not deterred by this freaky sight knelt down and ran at the fox like a bull ready to run him down again, and the fox slipped one foot a little further behind him and leaned back into a fighting stance ready to fight, or jump out of the way or slip between the turtles legs, that's what Carlos expected, but that's not what happened.

The fox suddenly and without explanation produced a large looking cooking pot, one that was large enough to contain a full turtle because Terry rammed into it and tipped it over onto its base where it was now sitting on a giant lit stove, the pot rapidly filled with water nearly up to the brim from an unknown source.

The fox disappeared behind the pot and emerged the other side dressed like a chef with a big floppy hat and everything. "Make sure the pan is full of water, and sealed like so!" the fox said in a French accent as he slammed a lid on top of the pan and clamped it shut. "Now preheat for fifteen minutes and if there's still life in him... " He said as he leapt up to sit on top of the lid that started to steam madly "...then he's a witch!"

The pot lid rattled and rumbled as Terry tried to break out of it, but his struggles didn't break the pots surface or the clamps or even put a dent in it.

Drake the duck took a few steps back in utter disbelief, his lower bill dropping open in horror and he turned and prepared to run from this mad fox, but the fox had somehow managed to get behind him within the blink of an eye preventing his retreat. "Now for ze duck!"

In a panic Drake pulled back his wing and prepared to smack him in the face. But before the punch could land the fox raised his leg and kicked the duck sharply in the stomach causing him to double over. The fox then swept the ducks feet out from under him causing the duck to land on what looked like an oversized chopping board that wasn't there a second ago. Carlos could tell it was chopping board because it had large knife cuts in it.

Rapidly the fox ran around Drake with the sort of speed you only see in cartoons and Drake yelped loudly a few times as he raced around. When the fox stopped he tossed a tone of feathers into the air, feathers he'd plucked from Drake leaving him totally feather-less. Drake tried to get up but he was now held down by straps and rope.

"Now that's the duck plucked and stuffed..." the fox in the chiefs' outfit said slowly walking towards Drakes head and reached into his pocket. "...now all that remains..." and from his pocket he pulled out a very sharp looking axe "...is to kill it!"

* * *

Tails raised the axe and prepared to swipe it down. It was what Drake deserved, he'd stuck a knife in one of his inventions and removed its CPU so it was only fair that he removed his head. With the axe now behind his back and what felt like thunder, angry thunder ringing in his head he brought the axe down. But his muscles suddenly went into spasm and locked up. The sharp blade of the axe stopped just a hairs distance from Drakes neck.

'_Whoa, whoa, whoa, WHOA!'_ said a voice in Tails' head '_what the heck am I doing?'_ He blinked a little as his brain suddenly realised what he was about to do. He looked at the sharp axe in his hand just nearly resting on a cowering Drake's neck, the ducks eyes were closed and close to tears.

What was he doing? He just wanted to humiliate them a little, maybe rough them up but this was going way too far, no he didn't want this! He lifted the axe up and tossed it into the side of the cooking pot causing it to burst open spilling its contents and releasing Terry from that death trap.

Tails took deep breaths as he looked around at the devastation he was causing and he fought to focus his thoughts. At least he could think now, before he could only rely on his instincts and for some reason he just couldn't think clearly at the time. Thinking about what he nearly did was too much, he was starting to hyperventilate!

Coming to his senses he wound his tails up and let them spin around rapidly forcing him to lift off rapidly into the sky and away from those three.

For some reason that one moment he nearly chopped Drake brought his mind back into perspective and made him realise what he was doing just in time. Wearing this mask was like a constant struggle to remain in control and he was in control to an extent. He wasn't possessed or anything like that, at least it didn't feel that way. It was as if someone had transplanted a new personality in place of his own, or something about him was taken away that would've stopped him otherwise. It was still him having these thoughts, still him doing these actions of his own free will, it just felt like the little voice in his head that tells him when enough was enough was silenced.

Now though he found he could remain in control of his actions and his thoughts as long as he remained focused because his mind was a jumble of thoughts of revenge, of food and a million other things he didn't understand the meaning of. But before he put the Mask on he could sort these thoughts out and choose whether or not to act on them but while he was wearing this mask he just has the urge to just do them and to heck with the consequences.

Tails took a deep breath, he should be fine now. As long as he remains focused he should be able to control this things awesome power and channel it for the purpose of good.

* * *

Sonic finally made it into Station Square, it took him quite a while to get there and he was only about twenty minutes or so behind Tails. That mask really made him more than supersonic it made him ultrasonic, he'd never seen anyone move so fast unaided by technology before in his life and in a little way Sonic felt a little jealous about it.

The hedgehog came to a stop in the main square of the city and looked around. Tails could be in any direction, on any floor, he could be anywhere in this city and with the speeds the fox could now get up to he could get from one side of the city to the other in seconds. Sonic could spend hours searching the city and not find him, and that's exactly what it felt like because he raced around and around the city searching Tails' usual stops like a local hardware store, DIY shop, the library none were open since it was still night time so it was unlikely Tails would be there anyway.

Tails had mentioned 'repaying a few bruises' before he took off. Sonic really hoped his friend wasn't going to do something he'd later regret. He knew Tails had been bullied for his odd appearance and his fascination with machines, two individual things which singled him out and made him a target. But Tails rarely spoke of before they met and Sonic wasn't the kind of person to pry into such personal matters, so he really had no clue who these 'bruises' were going to be repaid to.

Since rushing around the city wasn't helping him find Tails he decided to slow down to a walk. He ordered a chilly dog from a late opening vender on the street and slowly ate it as he walked, hey he had to eat and all this running around had made him hungry. He listened intently for any noise that might indicate where that fox in a mask had got to but all he could hear were the normal sounds of a busy city.

Looking up at a clock in the square he noticed it was midnight. Sonic had spent hours searching and so far turned up zip. That was until a few minutes later when he heard some commotion coming from some garages down a dark ally.

"Who was that green faced freak?" asked a rough sounding voice.

Sonic ate the last few mouthfuls of his chilly dog and licked the chilly that had split from it off his fingers before approaching the side alley being careful to remain out of sight.

"Wait until I get my hands on him, I'll kill him!" the voice said.

"He tried to kill me!" said a higher pitched voice.

"Maybe we should call the cops." Suggested a third voice that sounded like it was in pain.

Whoa, wait a sec. Did he just hear that right? Tails tried to kill someone? No, no he must've misheard, Tails wouldn't hurt a fly, he was mostly harmless unless you locked him in a warehouse full of mechanical parts but he'd never try to kill someone. Even throughout all their battles with Robotnik Tails had never appeared anything except harmless and innocent.

He was thinking of stepping out to ask where the green faced guy had gone when someone asked that question for him.

"Which way did he go? I'll kill him!" the rough sounding voice fumed.

"We didn't see where he went Carlos."

Sonic risked a glance around the corner and saw an armadillo with its protective armour shell missing –guess that made him an Illo-, a duck with all its feathers plucked and a very wet and red looking turtle, red as if he'd been burnt or boiled. This said one thing to Sonic, Tails had paid back the bruises he was talking about but none of them looked like they had been beaten to within an inch of their lives or nearly killed. They must be over reacting. Sonic saw firsthand what Amy could do in that mask and if Tails had intended to kill them then it would've been wholly within his power. Sonic had to shake his head, that thought sounded ridicules, Tails wouldn't hurt anyone even if the Mask did seem to cause some kind of shift in his personality, but if that shift was enough to make him do that to a bunch of bullies what else un-Tails-like would he do?

Sonic took off before any of them spotted him, they clearly had no other information of value to him. Where could Tails be now? Was he still in Station Square, was he back at his workshop? Sonic prided himself on keeping cool in unbelievably tense situations but this was really starting to worry him.

Suddenly Sonic spotted something and came to an immediate stop outside a movie theatre where a large crowd of humans seemed to have gathered around the entrance staring at something on the floor and from the centre of this crowd Sonic heard laughter, hysterical laughter.

Slowly he approached and squeezed through the crowd of much taller humans until he found what they were looking at. It was Tails! He was on his back, hands on stomach laughing as if someone had told him the universes funniest joke and he just couldn't stop. He was kicking his legs out as he rolled from one side of the floor to the other.

"Tails!" Sonic shouted to get his friend to acknowledge him.

"Hi Sonic!" Tails managed to say before bursting into laughter again.

"What's so funny?" Sonic asked putting his hands on his hips and looked at the green faced fox with a look that looked stern but in a cool sort of way.

Tails got to his feet and managed to curb his laughter long enough to speak. "I've just caught the midnight movie." He said pointing at the billboard over the cinema entrance advertising what was showing. 'The complete Saw Trilogy'

"Tails, you hate gory stuff like that." Sonic said raising an eyebrow, if there was anything more un-Tails like then this was it. It was a gory horror type movie that he shouldn't even be able to see at his age and it was dark and gruesome so what was so funny about it?

Tails grinned "I've just sat and watched the entire Saw trilogy at triple speed 4 times and IT KEEPS GETTING FUNNIER EVERY SINGLE TIME I SEE IT!" Tails, no this wasn't Tails anymore, that grin he'd just given Sonic along with that crazed look in his eyes sealed the fate of that illusion.

"Have you ever seen Saw? I've just saw Saw, I saw Saw four times. I even saw Saw 2, did you see Saw 2? Well I saw Saw 2 to!" he said this very fast "It gives me the feeling whoever came up with that title is seriously trying to mess with our minds!" he chuckled.

"I think it's time I removed that mask" Sonic said refusing to refer to this creature as Tails. The hedgehog adopted a fighting stance and prepared to fight his friend for his friend, if that made any sense.

"Oh" Tails moaned insincerely "Do you have to go so soon?" what was he talking about?

Suddenly Tails' legs became a whirl of motion but he did not move as if he was running on the spot, then he... he stepped out of the whirling effect as if he was stepping out of a car and the whirling effects just kept on going. Surprised at this sight Sonic wasn't ready for when Tails reached out and clamped his hand down on top of Sonic's head and lifted him up off the ground with just one hand and dropped him on top of that whirling thing. The moment he landed in it Sonic felt his legs suddenly jump to life and start turning and running at a mad pace, quicker than any pace he could ever do. Tails let go of his head and Sonic yelped in surprise as he shot forward at an uncontrollable run zooming out of the city in a matter of seconds and was unable to slow down or stop.

The last thing he heard from the thing in control of Tails was a smartalic remark.

"HEY, WHEN YOU ARRIVE IN AUSTRALIA DROP ME A POSTCARD!"

* * *

Tails watched Sonic vanish in a trail of smoke into the distance. He didn't know what possessed him to do that to Sonic only that it came into his head and something was forcing him to do it, he didn't even have to think about it, he just did it.

Tails shook his head and took in a deep breath. Hopefully Sonic won't be too annoyed at what he's done when he finally catches back up with him. He took another deep breath. The power this mask had was very difficult to control, it was as if a massive amount of energy was trying to squeeze its way through his body, like water spilling out of an open dam, the torrent was just as powerful if not more.

The green headed fox was suddenly aware that he was still surrounded by dozens of staring people who'd just watched him kick off in hysterics and sent the worlds' fastest hedgehog on a run beyond even Sonic's speed limit.

"Hey, why don't you all take a picture? It lasts longer!" he said but why did he say it, he didn't want to? He had to get out of here, he had to think again.

He bent his knees looked up and he suddenly found himself being fired into the air as jets of flames erupted from the souls of his trainers.

To control this thing took an amazing amount of concentration to pull off, it was difficult because there were a thousand voices chattering away to him inside his own head each wanting a say in what he was going to do next but he couldn't single out the voice of his conscience or his reason because all the voices were equally loud. It was like trying to talk to someone when there are a thousand other people chattering around you, and you're blind so you can't tell who it is you want to talk to, it was close to impossible.

An idea formed in his head. _Remove the Mask._It said, but that idea was soon pushed out of his mind before Tails could even register it as an idea. Like a dream it just faded away and he forgot he'd even thought it.

He just had to focus, to concentrate. He closed his eyes and listened to the voices in his head –despite the dangers of flying blind by rocket shoes- and tried to sort them out himself, but it was difficult. One voice was saying _'Boy, I sure could go for an ice-cream'_ another was thinking _'I wonder if that girl just down the street from my house likes me'_ a third was thinking _'I wanna go out and see what all the fuss about night clubs is about'_ and while he was rocketing through the air a fourth was singing.

"I'm a rocket man!"

'Rocket man'

"Burning out his fuse up here alone"

Suddenly he registered a hissing noise that became louder and louder until it was so loud it threatened to explode, and it did as something blasted into him from the back and his rocket shoes misfired and died.

"MAYDAY, MAYDAY, I'M GOING DOWN!" Tails screamed as the ground quickly started to approach him "MAYDAY, MAYDAY, MOTHER'S DAY, FATHER'S DAY, INDEPENDENTS DAY, SAINT GEORGES DAY, THE FITHTEETH WEDNESDAY AFTER PENTYCOST!"

Smack! Tail landed face first on solid rock and… he felt fine, in fact he didn't feel anything, no pain, no unpleasant stinging, not even an ache. He was totally fine. Weird.

He tried to pushed himself up but, and this was even weirder, his head appeared to be fused to the ground. He reached up and felt for his head but it wasn't there! He felt around for it, was it buried in the ground? He felt his fingers press against the back of his head, but his head felt as flat as a pan cake. Anyone looking at Tails would've thought he had his head buried in the ground but upon closer inspection you could see that his head was plastered to the stone floor as if a steamroller had just gone over it.

Frantically Tails felt for the edges of his head, it sounded ridicules but once he found his outline he pulled on it and his face gently peeled off the ground like a wad of gum stuck to the pavement.

With his head now peeled off Tails now had to work out how to un-flatten it. But like last time he instinctively knew what to do. He reached for a small bulb like spot on the front of his face he knew was his nose and while holding the hair at the back of his head Tails stretched his head outwards. His eyeballs popped back into existence and bulged out of his stretched face which snapped out of its flat position but was still very, very long and as soon as he let go it all slapped back into its original shape.

"Did anyone catch the number of that surface to air missile?" he asked his mind in a slight daze. What the heck had hit him and why wasn't he dead from the impact? He wasn't in Station Square anymore he could see that, he appeared to be in a flat wilderness standing on rough rocky ground.

Then the answer to his first question came as something small gently descended from the night sky. At first Tails thought it was Sonic again but that wasn't possible because Sonic couldn't fly, not without the combined Chaos Emeralds at least.

A great deal of dust blew up from the rocks around him as this thing started to land, it was obviously some kind of machine, a machine that looked a lot like Sonic. It's large bulb like head was made of smooth polished, blue metal with a black visor and red dots for eyes. The body was smaller than the head and appeared to have a jet engine installed where it's stomach should be and its skinny silver arms ended in hands with claws rather than fingers, his legs look much too stiff to be used for running but were quite useful when it came to landing.

Metal Sonic stood impressively like the villain of an epic thriller. His armour was highly polished and reflective which caught the glow of the moonlight in an eerie sort of way and its red eyes seemed to be scanning Tails intently, like the robot in Terminator.

"Hey, I know you" Tails said to the tin hedgehog, he knew it was Metal Sonic but that's not the sentence that left his mouth "I loved you in the wizard of Oz."

Metal Sonic slowly started to advance menacingly. Despite being a robot it had some very life like attributes such as menacing body language but apart from being menacing and frightening it wasn't capable of any other expression. Either way it looked at Tails like it meant him harm.

"You didn't get that heart you wanted did you?" Tails quipped, he didn't know why but even now all he wanted to do was just dance around and joke. "Now, now…" the fox said holding up his hands to show he was unarmed but continued to stand his ground. "I don't think Dorothy would like it if you pummelled the cowardly Lion."

All these quips didn't do anything to stop Metal from coming closer and closer, but then suddenly an idea formed in Tails' head and though he thought it wouldn't work he found himself doing it anyway.

"Hey, Metal. What's that?" he said looking beyond Metal at nothing, and amazingly Metal stopped and turned to look. What an idiot! Tails grinned manically and pulled a very warped face at Metal before shooting off in the opposite direction before the robot could turn back around again.

When the robot hedgehog did turn around and register Tails had vanished it began the process of quickly warming up its engines for a quick blast off. But before it could speed away Tails appeared again as if out of nowhere, quickly reached into his jacket and pulled out a large mallet that he swung around his back and slammed right onto Metals feet.

Reality was warped even further because that action caused Metal's head to fly off his body on an extendable neck, something that was not built into his original design. His head rose so far up it clanged into a bell which chose to materialize itself directly above making him into more of a fare ground game.

Tails swung the mallet back so it rested on his shoulder and grinned as he looked up at Metal who seemed to be having trouble adjusting to his new longer neck. His arms and hands fumbled to reach up and pull it back down again but sadly for Metal they were too short.

"You're going to have trouble picking your nose." Tails grinned. The mallet vanished and the fox prepared to run away again. He felt himself take off at high speed but came to a stop pretty rapidly when he felt Metal's claws grab hold of his tails.

"Hey! Let go!" Tails commanded "Off with you!" but Metal remained silent and intimidating, even as his comically long neck retracted back into his body casing. Tails struggled for a good few seconds before deciding on his next course of action.

"Okay, buddy. You asked for this!" Tails stood still and started spinning his tails in the same manner he would if he was flying. Metal still didn't let go but he was unlucky enough to be caught in the twisting tails. A large swirl of yellow, white, blue and red was all that could be seen as Tails continued to try to dislodge the irritating lump of metal and plastic from him, but his grip remained strong. Then Tails suddenly got another crazy sounding and implausible idea in his head.

Since Metal wouldn't let go of his tails, Tails simply 'let go' of his tails in a manner of speaking. Metal flew off high into the sky clutching a twin pair of tails which just detached from Tails himself who instantaneously appeared to grow two new ones. Freaky!

"Hey, saves time going to a retail store" he said to no one in particular. Why was he talking to himself, that was the first sign of madness and he wasn't mad, oh no, it was the rest of the world that was mad.

The masked fox turned to watch Metal vanish into nothing. "Tinhog is going, going, going… GOOOONE… WHOA!" Something just rushed up behind him and grabbed him in a very specific place, his face, his mask! Tails twisted himself round and found himself face to face again with…

"HEY! Hasn't some car ran you over yet!" Tails said to Sonic.

"I'm not joking anymore, give it up!" Sonic said but no matter how much effort the blue hedgehog put into pulling the rubbery active form of the Mask it only stretched and stubbornly refused to leave the fox's face.

"Get off my face!" Tails screamed "You can't have it back! It's mine!"

From behind Sonic, Tails saw something glinting in the night and the solid form of Metal started rushing down again right towards him. What was with him? What was it about Tails that attracted the robots attention so much?

"Look out, behind you!" Tails screamed a warning to Sonic suddenly feeling fearful for his friends life, but the hedgehog didn't pay the warning any mind nor did he look like he was taking him seriously. Sonic just continued to pull on the Mask but did manage to say "That's the oldest trick in the book!" before Metal slammed into both of them with almost deadly force.

Sonic rolled over Tails and was catapulted out of the way by Metals charging attack and when the hedgehog did start flying off in another direction Tails felt the pours on his face scream in agony. It felt like an enormous band aid had been forcefully ripped off his entire face.

He could think clearly again! His mind felt like doors were closing around it shutting out the excess noise and chatter, as if his mind was sealing itself back inside his head again, he felt normal, like he did before he put the Mask on. But as soon as he realized that he felt cold, metallic claws curl around his throat and lift him up off the ground making his breathing difficult.

Tails gasped and opened his eyes. Metal had him in a choking grip and if Tails didn't know better he'd say Metal had a sort of vaguely confusion look about him. Tails could hear the sensors and optical cameras in Metal's head whirling as if to make sense of him and as Tails gazed into that black visor it had he saw his own reflection.

That's why he felt so normal, it was because he was normal. His face was as it should be, yellow and white with blue eyes. The Mask must've come off his face when Metal rammed into them, but where the heck was it now? However that wasn't his immediate problem, because Tails got the sense that Metal was trying to decide whether it was worth killing him.

* * *

Sonic felt the sharp impact at his back. At first he expected that the thing controlling Tails had managed to attack him again, but as he flipped over out of the way he could see it was Metal Sonic. What was he doing here?

Though Sonic was bashed out of the way he refused to let go of that rubber mask and he felt it peel straight off his friends face as he flew over the foxes head. But then Sonic lost his grip on the thing when its stretchy rubber like substance suddenly snapped back, reformed and hardened back into wood and because of that quick transformation it flew out of his hands.

The hedgehog tried to manoeuvre himself so he could land back on his feet to engage Metal in battle because if Metal was here then they were in trouble, but unfortunately Sonic didn't have enough height to do this and ended up bashing his head against the solid stone ground.

He rolled over once or twice before coming to rest on his back. He lay there in a daze with his eyes tightly shut for a few seconds to let the pain pass. He heard what sounded like his best friend being choked by Metal. Sonic had to do something, but when he opened his eyes all he could see was the darkness of the sky which was unfocused due to his knock on the head. He had to save Tails but he just felt confused and concussed.

Slowly his vision began to clear and Sonic could see something in the sky above him that descending towards him rapidly, what the heck was that thing? He blinked and his vision started to clear up and became more focused. The thing about to land on him wasn't Metals foot or Metal's fist or anything like that, it looked too… green.

Suddenly the image resolved itself after a few seconds to reveal itself to be the solid wooden form of the Mask. Great, he'd managed to get it off Tails but now it was rapidly descending towards him facing upwards about to land on his own face!

"Uh oh!" Alerted to this fact Sonic was about to raise his arms and catch it, but his movements were too sluggish. The wooden Mask landed firmly on Sonic's face and pressed hard on his nose when it did. Sonic couldn't move, his body just felt paralyzed as if in shock, and he felt energy, lots and lots and lots of energy force its way through his face and rapidly spreading to the other parts of his body. His body trembled like he was having a fit making any movements he tried to make useless and he felt the Mask start to stretch itself over his head and he couldn't do a thing to stop it.

It joined together at the back of his head and then came a rush, a massive rush of energy racing through his system, more energy then he'd ever felt in his life, and in that moment there was a brilliant flash of light followed by an ear splitting bang!

* * *

As Tails waited for Metal to decide whether or not he was the same person as before and whether it'd be worth killing him their attention was distracted by a brilliant flash of white light. Tails and Metal turned their heads just in time to see Sonic's form twist into a whirling tornado which produced a high pitched whine as he span faster and faster and faster kicking up dirt from the surroundings as he did.

Somehow the Mask must've found a way onto Sonic's face and it was transforming him!

The twisters' height suddenly shot up into the air reaching beyond the clouds like a thin strand, light thunder could be heard for just a few seconds, then a massive lightning bolt shot down from the heavens twisted around the tornado's form before zapping the hedgehog at its whirling core.

Suddenly the lighting storm stopped as soon as it started and the tall twister rapidly shrank back to its original height, only now it was a whirl of bright blue light with a faint green core. It shot forward directly at Tails and Metal and slammed right into the robot hedgehog forcing it to let go of Tails' neck and sending it crashing into a boulder over a hundred yards away. Robotnik really built that thing to last because it was already getting up.

Tails took a few steps back from the tornado because the whirling wind that thing was kicking up was nearly enough to force him off his feet. He held up his hands to shield his eyes from the bright light which then faded rapidly just before the whirling form came to a complete stop. A light mist was surrounding the creature and what looked like steam seemed to be rising off it.

Tails jaw dropped. It was Sonic, or it looked like Sonic in some form. He stood there eyes closed with a slight smirk on his face, his green face which looked like it was moulded from thick, lime green rubber. Though the fur on his body remained blue the fur on his head had become a shade of dark green but more noticeably were his quills which were still swept back but where such a light shade of green they boarded on white and each clump of quills had split into four more making the back of his head look like a bed of needles, needles which seemed to glow in the darkness. His attire which usually consisted of red trainers and white gloves now consisted of black trainers with a red strap and buckle, white gloves and a very sleek looking black leather jacket.

Sonic, or the thing the Mask created from him, grinned coolly, or coolly as possible because his teeth where a pure white and looked a little unreal, almost cartoony from where Tails was standing. Then his eyes snapped open, they were a shining shade of scarlet and glowed as brilliant a white as his quills.

"Hi, there!" Sonic said raising his left hand which still seemed to be emitting some sort of steam or smoke and blew gently on it like a marksman blowing the barrel of a smoking gun. Then Sonic turned his head coolly to look at Tails his expression adopting a familiar Sonic like grin but now seemed to have an added expression of mischief to it. "I'm SSSSSSSSSsssmokinnn'!"

* * *

**To Be Continued…**

* * *

**Authors notes:** This chapter went through a few re-writes because I just couldn't decide what I wanted Tails/Mask to be like. The Mask can build on a characters personality like Amy's but more often produces a Mr. Hyde to the wearers Dr. Jekyll and that's what I wanted to do with Tails, but every time I was a little unhappy with the results. In most cases Tails/Mask (or Tailspin as I've nicknamed him) was too dark in both humour and his actions so I was constantly toning him down, and in some cases I toned him back up again because I felt it wouldn't accomplish what I intend to do with the character.

I took most inspiration for 'Tailspin' from Betelgeuse, the mischievous ghost from Beetlejuice. But I also wanted to show how the Mask manipulates its wearer, though it's not supposed to make the wearer want to kill people –at least not at first- it can slowly manipulate the wearer into thinking such actions are okay. It can also create a person who's drastically different from the wearer, and that's more the direction I wanted to go with Tailspin. Like Stanley Ipkiss in the Mask movie.

I have to admit in a way I feel a little guilty about what I've made it do to Tails. The main core of the character is his youth and innocence and turning that on its head though it was fun to write did make me feel like I was spoiling the character somewhat. But reading up on the character earlier before creating 'Tailspin' I found that it was the logical thing the Mask would do and was the only way I could think of making Tails' Mask interesting.

Please let me know what you thought of Tails/Mask 'Tailspin'.

For those interested, the chapters title Phantasmagoria refers to 'a fantastic sequence of haphazardly associative imagery, as seen in dreams or fever.' but is also a form of theater which uses lanters to project scary images onto smoke or semi-transparent screens.

-Hope you all enjoyed the new chapter.


	8. Static the Hedgehog

**Act 3**

**Chapter 7**

**Static the Hedgehog**

Sonic looked down at his sleeves, then at his gloves before running his hands through his now bristly, white spines before looking back at his hands again. A thick electrical charge ran from his hands and dissipated through his body.

"Whoa, I feel all charged up!" he said smiling again. Tails found there was something unnerving about that smile Sonic now had. Usually Sonic's grin looked confident, maybe even a little mad but this new Sonic's smile was boarding on scary.

"Sonic?" Tails asked a little unsure if this was truly Sonic anymore and the hedgehog confidently winked at him.

"Who else could look this cool?" he asked as smoke and steam continued to rise up from his form as if he was cooking with energy trying to escape.

There came a loud clunk as something heavy landed right behind them. Tails and Sonic turned to see Metal looking from one of them to the other with what Tails could only described as a confused look, probably of how the green one had somehow changed from one person to another.

"Back off Bolt Butt, or I'll take you apart, piece by piece!" Sonic warned the robot, but though his mouth told him to back off his face and body language said different, 'bring it on' it seemed to be saying.

Suddenly the mechanical hedgehog shot forward like lightning and clamped his claws around Sonic's arms so tightly that it looked like he was about to break them. There came a loud whine from somewhere inside Metals interior workings and in the next second Sonic was lit up like a neon light bulb, momentarily Sonic's skeleton was visible through his skin before Metal halted the electrocution.

"Wow... you know, I kinda liked that!" Sonic said in a slightly husky voice still alive and un-fazed after that, he was only a little burnt. "Hey Metal!" Sonic said knocking on Metals head case with an arm he'd somehow managed to get free of Metals grip. "A lesson in electronics."

Suddenly Sonic's spikes became tangled and un-kept and from under his nose he sprouted a fake looking white moustache. "Current flows from a higher potential difference to a lower potential difference." Sonic said in a thick German accent before his appearance and voice morphed back as quickly as they had reformed. Then Sonic then rapidly rubbed his hands together so roughly that electric sparks actually started to flow around his hands and his quills began to pulsate a bright white "and people say I've got great potential!"

After the bad quip Sonic clamped his hands to Metals pointy ears and the robo-hedgehog's metallic body suddenly got a massive jolt of electricity, his joints locked up and his red optical sensors glowed so bright it was almost as if the robot was in both shock and pain.

Once the shock was finished Metal's sensors locked onto Sonic's face and his hands released the masked hedgehog only to clamp over Sonics head! It looked like he was trying to rip Sonic's face apart but all he seemed to succeed in doing was stretching Sonic's cheeks out, the blue and green hedgehog did not appear to come to any harm though.

"Still doesn't hurt!" Sonic grinned and unexpectedly thrust his head forward giving Metal a head butt that forced the robot to let go of his green face and allowed everything to snap back into place. The hedgehog drummed his fingers on his cheeks and grinned manically. "All back in place."

As Metal regained his balance he prepared to grab a hold of Sonic again. But Sonic held up his hand as if for silence and Metal amazingly did stop. Sonic grinned and waved his fingers before saying "Catch me if you can!"

Tails didn't even see the movement, one moment Sonic was there the next he had vanished leaving only a large amount of kicked up dust in his wake as he ran away and as soon as Metal realised this he'd blasted off after him, albeit at what appeared to be a much slower pace.

Tails was going to try to catch up with Sonic, but he didn't even attempt it because he knew even if he tried that he'd never be able to keep up with him now, and with all this weirdness now gone Tails was left alone in the middle of nowhere. Left alone with his thoughts and memories, and he didn't like what he was remembering, remembering what that thing had turned him into.

He had to find Sonic and get that mask off him before he seriously hurt someone.

* * *

Oh now this was a rush, this was fun! Sonic felt like every nerve ending in his body was live, he'd never felt such power before in his life. Think of the moment you felt most alive, most active, most full of energy and times that feeling by a million and you were still nowhere near it. He instinctively knew he had the ability to do anything and everything, to be it all and none at all at the same time, he could warp reality to his desires, make things happen that would normally be impossible. He felt like a god, and it felt good.

Right now he was running, oh boy he was running, running like he had never ran before. He liked running and being able to run fast because it gave him a sense of freedom, and this Mask felt like the ultimate freedom you could have, ever. Things that usually held him back, things in his mind, they were gone, wiped clean, he could do whatever he wanted and not worry about the consequences because there was nothing to hold him back, not even himself.

He was running so fast he could barely make sense of it all, yet he somehow managed to avoid obstacles, what was guiding him, the Force? He was also travelling faster than he could normally travel without this mask_. I'd better be careful or I'll spin the planet the other way_. Okay, enough running. Sonic put his breaks on and prepared to stop and engage Metal in battle. From the speed he was going he was slowing down a little slower than usual but when he did he... was facing Tails, again? Huh? Sonic looked around, he was back where he'd started he must've gone completely around the planet. But in two minutes? That's what he called speed!

"Sonic!" Tails jumped at the sight of him appearing like that. "Sonic, wait that Mask, it..." Tails began but Sonic interrupted him "It'll have to wait Tails! Metal can't be far away, and I'm gonna ram him into the ground!"

"But Sonic…" Tails complained but the blue and green hedgehog didn't hang around for the rest of the sentence. He shot forward again running to catch Metal up. Since Sonic had gone around the planet Metal would still be following him at a much slower speed and sure enough there he was, the glow of his jet propelled engine was just ahead. Sonic grinned broadly as he sent himself into a forward spin -he'd always wanted to do something like this- and smashed right into the back of Metal forcing the robot to crash into a solid oak tree causing that to splinter and snap like a twig.

Sonic halted his progress and came to stand perfectly balanced on the delicate twigs on top of another tree. "That's taken you down a 'twig'! HA!" man that was bad, why was he coming up with all these bad jokes? It's going to ruin his reputation. So focused was he on coming up with that corny line that he wasn't ready for when Metal came shooting out of the forest like a bullet and slammed into Sonic with enough force to crack a few ribs, but with the protection this Mask seemed to offer his ribs felt fine, in fact he still couldn't feel anything.

Knocked off his perch Sonic quickly began to race towards the ground. But the ground wasn't just ground there was... Oh no... there was water! A lake! He was going to land in the middle of a lake! "Oh I hate water!"

Splash! He felt himself impact the water and kick up a spray, he may be impervious to attack but he didn't want to place any bets that the Mask would stop him from drowning. "Ahhhh! I can't swim, help, I…" Sonic whaled, but... okay... this was odd, how come he can talk while under water now and why doesn't he feel wet? Water always felt wetter then this and... was it him or was the floor he was standing on not stable?

Sonic looked down at his feet and... _you... have... GOT... to be kidding..._ he was standing on the water as if it was solid ground! Waves and ripples rolled under his feet but his body wasn't breaking the surface. He tapped his foot on the surface and ripples radiated out from where he tapped it. "I thought I was sunk, Ha!" He crossed one leg over the other and using his arms he sent himself into quick twirl before stopping and moonwalking a little across the waters surface "Forget walking, I'm the first to moonwalk on water!"

High above he spotted Metal hovering in the air gazing down at him and Sonic couldn't think of anything to do but wave at his metal double mockingly before taking his own lower eyelids and stretching them down so much he imagined they must look horrific, but it seemed to do what Sonic intended, annoy the tin hedgehog. There came a bright flash from Metal and a light, like a star was heading straight towards him, getting larger and larger, a star or a missile, a missile that was about to hit him! Usually Sonic would just calmly step out of the way but his surprise and shock caused an undesirable effect in that his eyes popped out of their sockets and inflated a little to the sound of a whirling alarm. His eyes then returned to their sockets, he only had seconds before impact and very quickly he came up with a very strange idea to avoid it.

From his mouth he started emitting a loud whale of an alarm like the sort you'd get on a submarine. "DIVE, DIVE" Sonic's voice said as if through a tannoy system before he swung his legs out behind him and dived head long into the water leaving nothing but bubbling water mere seconds before the missile impacted with a massive explosion.

Sonic felt the impact and the pressure wave from under the surface, but it just washed right over him, it was a really strange sensation surviving something that should kill you.

* * *

From Metals point of view, the water's surface was burning with residual flames from the explosion. As far as the robot was concerned the creature he was just fighting was dead, nothing could've have survive that missile impact directly. Or so Metal thought until a hand slowly rose from the surface, no a full arm held up straight with the hand bent at a ninety degree angle with the fingers stretched out and converging at the finger tips.

The 'creature' was now emitted a noise that registered to Metal as a radar scanner, the hand then rotated this way and that as if it was supposed to be a crude version of a periscope though the meaning of this imitation escaped Metals logical brain.

The hand continued to rotate until the fingers pointed directly at Metal and they froze for a few seconds. Then the hand disappeared down into the water and something launched itself from the surface straight towards him. It took Metal only nanosecond to recognise it as a hook and line like on a fishing rod though why it was flying through the air or why it was wrapping tightly around this units neck it did not know. But when it felt the line become taught as if whatever was on the end of it was trying to drag him down Metal immediately blasted off in the opposite direction to snap the line or drag whatever it was to the surface, and it did.

What was on the end of the line was the green faced hedgehog who was holding a fishing rod in one hand and was holding a fishing hat on his head with the other, and he appeared to be water skiing on his shoes despite them not being suitable for water skiing.

"This must be what they call fly-fishing" the hedgehog quipped.

* * *

Sonic began to reel in his catch a little, bringing him closer and closer to Metal. When he felt he was close enough he turned the reel so quickly that he launched himself up off the water's surface and used the wire as a guideline for his homing attack, and with the powers of this Mask this should be some homing attack, and it was.

The moment he impacted Metal the robot's solid and sturdy metal body fractured, split and broke apart at the joints. Metals arms, legs, head and body completely separated and rained down into a nearby field forming into a large pile of parts and scrap.

Sonic landed gracefully on his feet next to the pile of remains from his robot double ganger and he watched as Metals red optical sensors in his head slowly die and faded to a plain black visor. There then came a click and Metals head actually split around his face and it slid off the main head casing exposing the interior electronics, the face plate rolled a little before coming to a stop at Sonic's feet.

"I said I'd take you apart" Sonic said as he slipped his foot under Metals face plate, kicked it up and caught it in his hand. He held it out in front of him at arm's length with the face plate facing him and said "Ah, Alas I knew him so well" he grinned "Shame you didn't have one of these." Sonic said pulling on the rubber mask, distorting his facial features before letting it go and have it all snap back into place.

Sonic then flipped the face plate over so it faced the other way so he was looking directly into it and... Huh? There was a black screen that appeared to have a series of numbers running up and down it. That must be what Metal sees he guessed. To get a better look he placed the face plate over his own eyes, what does a soulless machine like Metal see anyway?

Through the streams of numbers the screen showed a darkened image of the world around him, highlighted in bright colours and pixilated images. But that was the background, around the sides were an array of charts and bars the function of which Sonic could only guess at, except one that was blinking on and off indicating battery remaining, the bar on that was nearly empty. _Somehow I don't see Metal running on regular double AA's._ A stray thought seemed to say in his head. But what caught Sonic's eye was an image of himself, the new Sonic, it was a perfect image, right in the centre of his vision. But the picture appeared to be highlighted in certain colours in certain area's of Sonic's body. Sonic's torso, arms and legs were shaded in blue and a label identified him as 'Sonic the Hedgehog' but the head of this image was green and was labelled with the words 'One additional life form, unknown origin'. Then the screen lost power and went black completely.

"Life form?" Sonic asked aloud removing the face plate from his eyes and turning it over to use the black visor as a mirror to look at his green features. "This thing a life form? Naah!" he uttered tossing the face plate over his shoulder and heard the plate crack as it hit something on the ground.

He then gazed over the wreckage of Metal and tapped his foot impatiently "What a JIP!" he said crossing his arms over his chest like a disappointed child who'd broken a toy "Has he got a guarantee? Might as well send him back to the manufacturer for a refund!"

Swinging his arms Sonic sent himself into a spinning tornado ago, a tornado that swept up all Metals parts in its whirling winds allowing them to orbit around Sonic at the centre. He was going to take these part's back to the manufacturer, the manufacturer being Eggman himself, Robotnik industries, toilet brush 'tash limited.

* * *

Why wasn't it responding? Robotnik typed in the command again into his computer. '_Access unit Metal sensors'_ but still the screen produced the same message '_Could not connect to unit Metal'_. Robotnik drummed his fingers on the console, he supposed Metal Sonic might be in a cave or somewhere that blocked his tracking signal, but it had never happened before.

To make sure, he typed in the command again for a fourth time and still the same message came back '_Could not connect to unit Metal_'. Robotnik scratched his balled head. He wanted to see if Metal had caught up with that strange object he'd detected moving very fast away from Tails' workshop, he wanted to see what it was just because, and he didn't mind admitting it, he was a nosey guy.

There came four knocks. Was something jamming in his control room? He swivelled his chair and looked around, on the walls there were many pistons and hydraulic arms pumping away performing a function that would not be obvious to someone not technically minded like he was.

It came again, four knocks but as far as he could tell none of his machines were sticking, or catching or anything that could produce such a noise.

DING DONG! A doorbell? He didn't have a door bell, what use would he have for a door bell in a top secret, hidden base?

He swivelled his chair back to the console and switched on the intercom to the outside. There was a grill outside the main entrance that read his voice print so only he could access the secret lab. Now he was going to use it to see if there was someone outside playing around, and he cursed himself for not putting a surveillance camera on that door.

"Who's there?" he asked irritatingly.

"CAAAAABLE GUUUUUY!" replied a voice that sounded like it belonged to someone with a mental defect.

Robotnik was about to say something else when there came an almighty crash followed by a flashing warning on his computer. 'ALERT, ALERT MAIN ENTRANCE HAS BEEN BREACHED!' How was that possible? Those doors were stronger then steel!

BANG, went the door to the control room which was ripped apart like it was made of paper and through it came a whirling blue and green tornado that kicked up such a gust Robotnik felt like he was going to roll out of his chair.

The whirling wind came to an abrupt halt revealing a hedgehog, but this was not Sonic, this hedgehog was green, his face was like rubber, his quills were shining white and his teeth could open up beer bottles.

"Hi there Ro-butt-nik" he said as he heaved a black rubbish bag off his shoulders which clanked as it moved "Thought I'd return this!" and the hedgehog upturned the bag, it flapped open and a mass of mechanical parts scattered across the floor, it wasn't until Robotnik caught sight of a robot's smashed face plate that he suddenly realised why Metal had not been responding to his commands.

"Metal! How, what...?" the round scientist never got his words out because the hedgehog leaped into his next sentence.

"Has he got a guarantee? I was playing with him and he broke in under a minute!"

"Who the heck are you?" Robotnik fumed getting out of his chair, which creaked badly as he stood up.

Within moments three guard bots, the tough one's Sonic had trouble defeating earlier came rushing through the door. These carried electric staffs that could shock, disable even paralyze whoever came into contact with them and would no doubt make short work of this poser.

"I don't know anymore" the hedgehog said answering Robotniks last question. The green rodent laced his fingers together and his knuckles cracked, as he did that a few sparks and arcing electrical discharges ran over them and around his body like he was hooked up to the mains somewhere. "I used to have a name, but it doesn't suit me anymore. But I think you can call me Static..." Without taking his eyes off Robotnik he flung out his left arm behind him with his fingers arced. His entire arm burst into life with electrical energy which shot from his finger tips.

Arcing lightning wrapped around the three guard bots sending their metallic bodies into uncontrollable spasms, their eyes suddenly burst with electrical energy like erupting volcanoes before explosions and implosions rattled in their bodies as every computer chip and circuit board fried. But that was not possible! Robotnik had built them to be shock resistant, this hedgehog would have to produce energy on a massive scale not seen anywhere before to do this!

The arcing electricity stopped flowing from the green hedgehog's fingers and he retracted his arm. The three robots stood still smoking wildly for a couple of seconds before their legs just collapsed from under them sending them all to the ground in a heap. "Yeah, I like that name..." He said blowing on his fingers that now had smoke and steam lightly flowing off them. "...Static the hedgehog. What do you think?" he said as his crimson eyes turned to observe Robotnik and he grinned a grin as insufferable as that irritating blue hedgehogs grin.

"Never mind who the heck are you?" Robotnik said his jaw hanging open aghast and his eyes wider then they had ever been before "'What' the heck are you?"

Suddenly the obese scientist felt something rise up from underneath him and he started running because it felt like the floor was sliding from under him. He looked down and saw his massive, heavy foot falls were running along a treadmill, a treadmill? Where had that materialised from?

"What I am, Jabba the Gut, is your new fitness instructor" said Static who had now, somehow quickly dressed himself in the clothes of a GYM instructor "come on now! My name is Static and I'm ecstatic, some say manic, and just don't panic 'cos you're gigantic!" He rhymed "It's time to turn, let that stomach churn, and just feel that burn, I'll make you learn. Keep that pace and straighten that back or you will have a heart attack!"

"What the heck's going on?" Robotnik panted, his gut jiggled up and down like a bowl full of jelly and he began to wheeze, he was not built for this!

"You're shedding pounds is what's going on." Static then turned a dial on the control panel at the treadmills side up to eleven. "Come on, you're a wrecking machine, stay away from the canteen, just show you're keen and just pray this doesn't rupture your spleen!"

"No, Stop! Stop it! Please, I can't take it!" he wheezed. He tried to slow down and slip off the back of the treadmill but a strap had suddenly appeared that went around his back firmly keeping him in the middle of the rotating walkway.

"Come on you Egg on legs! Cut out the bacon and eggs, stay away from Greg's and..."

"WILL YOU STOP THAT IRRITATING RHYMING!" Robotnik managed to shout between puffs.

"Hey, less talking, more running." Static ordered "I'll have you turned into a Charles atlas before you know it. Even if it kills you!"

A bleeping sound distracted Static from his rhyming. He looked at his watch and his features seemed to relax a little. "Uh oh, looks like we'll have to reschedule our training, you see I have other things to do before the nights out, but look on the bright side! You've lost five pounds in sweet already!"

Static grinned at him so broadly Robotnik could nearly see his own reflection in his teeth, both rows started grinding together producing a strange yammering sound. Then the green hedgehog zoomed off out the door in the blink of an eye leaving Robotnik to continue running on the treadmill his face turning a bright shade of red, then magenta with the strain.

"Someone *Huff* turn this stupid thing off!"

* * *

**To Be continued...**

* * *

**Authors notes:** I've named Sonic's Mask Static, because the names both sound similar and I wanted Sonic's Mask to have a fondness for Static electrical attacks. The word Static I think is also a slang word in America to mean gun or weapon.

I wanted Static to do something that previous Mask's haven't done yet, so I made him rhyme like an insane rapper, and very badly.

Sonic's Mask is similar to how he really is, only he now doesn't have his inhibitions to stop him, his inhibitions being fear, compassion, pity and so on. Now he's basically a creature who's only desire is to be amused.

Hope you enjoyed Sonic's alter ego and the chapter overall.

Cheers


	9. How to make stuff up and irritate people

**Act 3**

**Chapter 8**

**How to make stuff up and irritate people.**

This was hopeless, Tails thought to himself, how was he going to track down a hedgehog travelling at the speed of light when he had trouble keeping up with the genuine –and apparently much slower- article?

He just had to find Sonic, he had to make him understand what he only now understood. That mask was dangerous if you couldn't focus your thoughts, if you couldn't sort out the millions of voices chatting away to you in your head then it just takes total control of you and you do everything on a whim instead of a logical thought process, you thought of something and you did it, no matter how twisted it may be. Whatever that mask does it clearly gives the wearer the power to live out their own desires, esepcailly the ones they didn't even know they had.

He had to track him down. Tails tried to think, what would Sonic do with such powers, where would he go and what would he do? Who would he hurt? Would Sonic have even more control over himself then Tails did? He was, after all able to channel the total power of the Chaos Emeralds and still remain in control so maybe he could control this power, but deep down Tails sadly doubted he actually could.

Tails wasn't proud of what he'd done while he was wearing that thing. In fact he was horrified. It made him seek revenge on the bullies he had at a younger age, it also made him sit through a grotesque, horror movie he felt he enjoyed in memory, but when he remembered scene's from the film itself it just shivered him to his soul. How could he sit down in front of a series of sick movies like that and enjoy it, how could anyone?

It least it was over now, Sonic had managed to remove the thing from his face after hours of confusion and unpredictable behaviour. But then the Mask had to land on Sonic's face. Tails gulped. Why did he try that mask on? If he'd just left it alone then neither he nor Sonic would be in this mess.

"Hi Tails" said a cheery voice. Tails was so focused on his thoughts that he jumped as he heard it. Coming towards him waving her left arm at him was Amy Rose. As she approached she said "Geese Tails, relax it's only me."

"Amy... what are you doing out so late?" Tails asked.

"I could ask you the same thing." Amy shrugged. "Where's Sonic?" She then asked.

"I don't know" Tails admitted, "I'm looking for him."

"Oh! I can help you there" Amy said excitement clearly building in her. Though Amy and Tails were friends the twinned tailed fox actually believed she'd only hang out with him if there was even a remote chance of finding Sonic, so it was a surprise when she'd just offered to help him find the speedster. He'd expected her to go looking for him on her own and no doubt the moment she found him she'd try to obtain his maximum attention, unsuccessfully like before. However Tails doubted she was ready to meet this new version of Sonic if he was as bad as he was himself. "I have a built in Sonic detection system" she then elaborated "I can find my way to him in the dark!" and Tails had no doubt she could.

"It's a good thing the green works in the dark!" said a voice that proceeded a massive bang of a sonic boom followed by a large gust of wind kicked up by a rapidly decelerating, familiar and yet alien hedgehog. His feet literally came to a stop right next to them and his body tilted backwards and forwards rapidly like when you strike a ruler half hanging over the edge of a desk. "You should've been their Tails, I made Robotnik work out!" He laughed before he twisted to look back the way he had just come. He raised his hands to his mouth and shouted back "RUN EGGMAN, RUUUUUUNN!"

"Sonic…!" Tails started but was interrupted by Amy's battle cry.

"SOOOONIC!" she squealed and prepared to fling herself forward and wrap her arms around him but she stopped short when she realised the change in him, she then pulled back in bewilderment "What… What have you done to your face?" She'd finally spotted the green mask covering his head and the white spines on his head and back that, now that Tails could see them in a newer light, looked a little like a jagged bolt of lightning.

"Groovy isn't it, anyway can't stop, I've got things I wanna do. I just dropped by to tell Tails I took Metal apart like the giant Tonka Toy he is." Before Sonic could run off again Tails piped up. "Wait, Sonic! That mask is dangerous"

"What mask?" Amy asked still none the wiser of what was going on.

"You don't know what you're talking about Tails" Sonic said as electrical sparks lightly erupted from his white quills "I'm having the time of my life!"

"Hey, wait a minute" Amy said suddenly "that dream I had last night wasn't a dream was it?" her eyes grew wide as realisation dawned and her face was starting to turn rosy red. "Oh... oh no!" and her face then turned very red. Tails ignored Amy's epiphany, and he didn't really want to know what went on last night between them either, what was important was making Sonic realise that the power he now holds can and will go to your head.

"Sonic, while wearing that Mask you do things you wouldn't normally do!" Tails tried to explain, but Sonic didn't appear to be listening.

"You know I'm pretty sure there's a very good reason why that's a bad thing…" he said as he stuck his left index finger in his left ear, dug out a little earwax and flicked it away "BUT I'M JUST NOT SEEING IT!"

Just then Sonic quickly tried to escape them but he stopped short when Amy stepped into his path.

"Oh no you don't!" she said sternly while looking Sonic right in the eye "You listen to me Sonic! I've seen hero's fall to the dark side in movies, but I won't let it happen to you…"

Though Amy looked stern and a little annoyed Sonic just relaxed very quickly, his eye lids drooped then he stretched out his left arm and yawned into his right before scratching the back of his head. As Amy continued on he rolled his eyes and mimicked Amy's flapping lips by holding up his right hand and opening and closing his fingers and thumb while mouthing nonsense with his own lips without speaking.

"...I don't know what's going on here, but it sounds like it's something you shouldn't be medalling in..."

Sonic then sat down on, what Tails guessed was, an invisible stool, picked out a news paper from nowhere at all and flicked a pencil into existence in his right hand. Sonic looked like he was deep in thought as the green headed hedgehog looked down at the paper. Tails leaned forward to see what he was doing. He was doing a crossword? That was really not like Sonic at all. "Hmm..." Sonic mused to himself "A three letter word for 'someone unable to take a hint', must be 'Amy'" he muttered obviously just fooling around, something that didn't stop Amy's motor mouth.

"… second I don't like the new green faced look and that attitude your sporting now, thirdly if you want any chance of being with me you'll… hey!" she finally realised she was being ignored. She angrily took the top of the news paper and ripped it from the green headed Sonic's grasp and smashed it into the floor in a fit and screamed "ARE YOU LISTENING TO ME!"

But Amy's rage quickly turned to fear when Sonic reached out quickly and grabbed her arms very roughly. "Sonic!" Amy squealed as her hero got to his feet from the invisible stool and just stared straight at her with what looked like menace in his eyes. "Amy, come here a second" For one awful moment Tails thought Sonic was going to hit Amy but then he did something equally unexpected.

He pulled her forward suddenly so their lips met, Amy looked like she was too shocked to fully realise what was happening to her as Sonic kissed her, actually kissed her, passionately and of his own free will. His hands left her arms and snaked around the back of her head as he just continued to kiss her and Amy was just frozen in shock, she was either too shocked to resist or just unwilling to resist. Sparks and fireworks erupted from her hair, literally fireworks were erupting from her head when her quills stood on end and fired sparks out the back.

This lasted for about half a minute before Sonic broke off and smoothly moved her from his original escape path. She was still shocked and looked dazed and confused but the look of pleasure was clearly trying to break through to the surface.

"'That' shut her up." Sonic said before he zoomed off at the speed of light leaving Tails with the zombie Amy who just stared and started to dizzily swing from one foot to the other.

"Amy, are you alright?" Tails asked with concern.

"Please, tell me this isn't a dream" Amy said still in shock.

There came a zooming sound and Sonic suddenly appeared next to Amy again holding out a scrap piece of paper for her to take "Hey, by the way" he said and she took it without thinking "give me a call sometime, we should go out." With that said he raced off again before either of them could speak.

Amy looked down at the piece of scrap paper with Sonic's number on it. "Please don't let this be a dream." She clenched the paper to chest as if it meant life and death to her. If hearts could really erupt out of a person when they were like this then Amy would be a volcano. "Oh, I never thought Sonic would ever ask me that!"

"Yeah, nor did I" Tails commented without thinking "He's defiantly not himself."

"And what is 'that' supposed to mean?"

* * *

Having the powers of a god was great and all, but Sonic had to admit he was getting bored with the Mask and its power. Initially he'd gone totally nuts with the power. He had the ability to do anything, that would blow anyone's mind but now he felt calm and more relaxed as he got used to the Mask like someone would get used to a new pair of shoes. But as he experimented and got used to it the novelty started to wear fast because whatever he did none of it was dangerous enough, in fact none of it was dangerous at all. None of the insane stunts and death defying feats he preformed didn't feel fun anymore without the sense of danger, with the Mask's powers he was invulnerable, unable to die or even get injured and that was just boring to Sonic.

The blue hedgehog believed that the time you are most alive was when you were just inches from death and survived, snapping your hand away from death before he sunk his claws into you. With the Mask that sensation was gone, it made everything numb which was a shame because that was one of his defining characteristics being a daredevil who did dangerous stuff for the fun of it, he just liked to be in dangerous situations and survive what better rush was there?

But rather then do the obvious thing and remove the Mask, which Sonic thought about but oddly was something 'Static' didn't want to do despite the list of things he could think was wrong with it, Sonic or maybe it was Static had decided to try a different approach to amuse himself. Making Robotnik run on a treadmill and annoying Amy was amusing to him, it was fun to see their reactions at what he could do to them and make them do that he decided to do a lot more, in fact as he sat up on top of the tallest structure in Station Square he looked through a roll of paper he had magically produced with a list of things he wanted to do on it.

"Let's see now, 'Take Metal apart', Check, 'Make Robotnik work out' it's a first, but check. 'Ask Amy out on a date' check, but I think I'll skip that." Static grinned mischievously as he spun the pen very fast between his fingers "Always keep them hungry." He clenched his fist and caught the pen in his palm precisely. "Now let's see" he said clicking the pen a couple of times "who can I bug next?"

The paper and pen vanished and Sonic leapt from his perch and accelerated towards the ground at breakneck speed. But he placed his feet on the side of the building and started running down it and when he reached the bottom he pulled up, changed direction and catapulted himself down the street and out of Station Square in a matter of seconds, breaking the sound barrier tenfold, and all the windows along his path.

* * *

The squawking of birds and the howl of the wind in the night is all he could hear, sweet silence. There was nothing around for miles, nothing on his island, except maybe for a few animals, insects, birds and other stuff but nothing that was threatening or even a danger to him, or the object he'd pledged his life to guard, the Master Emerald.

Knuckles the Echidna could not see anything because he had his eyes closed, he breathed in deep through his nostrils and exhaled slowly through his mouth. How long had he been standing here? Two maybe three days without food nor water apart from what he'd brought with him. It was a lonely life but he had pledged his life to guard the giant green emerald behind him which stood taller than he was. For the longest time he'd never understood why it needed guarding, he only knew it contained great power. It's what kept Angel Island levitating in the air after all, one of the reasons this land was so difficult to locate on a map and why it was so secret, it levitated above the sea and it moved.

The island was covered with many buildings and constructions of a civilisation long, long since gone leaving the buildings to collapse and fall into decay, all except for this pedestal which held the Master Emerald which, though crumbled and damaged, still stood tall and strong.

Knuckles breathed in deeply again and exhaled, listening for any sense of anyone who might be foolish enough to take the Master Emerald because after a long time he'd eventually found out the Emeralds powers were not just limited to levitation. Inside was a creature of unimaginable power, especially when it adsorbed the seven Chaos Emeralds. It was this creature, called Chaos the God of Destruction that brought about the destruction of the arrogant inhabitants of this long dead civilisation. But the creature had been stopped and now it and its guardian remain trapped literally inside the Master Emerald. Only after Chaos was released by Dr. Eggman Robotnik did Knuckles find out about this and fully understand the burden and responsibility he had, he had to prevent the Chaos, god of destruction from being released again, like he had been not long ago.

Knuckles became aware of a warmth from behind him that made his eyes open. The entire dark platform he was guarding, which was lit by many flaming torches he had lit himself, was now bathed in an ominous green glow.

He turned and looked back at the Master Emerald, it was glowing, brightly. Warily Knuckles turned around and approached the giant gem stone his eyes wide as he stared into the brilliant green glow. What was this? Was this Eggman's doing? He gazed into the crystal's reflective surface and saw his own reflection.

Knuckles the Echidna was an Echidna, he stood tall with red fur, piercing, staring eyes, a mouth that rarely smiled, a long snout and a toned body which gave off the impression of someone who had a great deal of strength. On each of his gloves were two large, tall lumps that acted as his knuckles and were very painful for anyone on the receiving end of them. His chest had a white mark on it that he was born with, so he guessed it made it a birthmark, it was in the shape of a crescent moon laying on its back, if it was supposed to represent something then it escaped Knuckles brain all together.

Suddenly his reflection vanished from the polished emerald and was replaced by something else, there was a shape forming before him. It began as a several swirls of pale green but they gently formed, merged together and twisted around each other to form one massive blob of green. The Master Emerald had never done this or anything like this before.

The green blob he saw began to gain features and a proper shape. What the heck was it? It had two eyes and a mouth which slowly started to appear, part of the surface uplifted from the apparent face where the nose should've been. It extended out and four equally spaced blobs appeared along it. What the heck was that? A face, a helmet, a mask?

The image became more clear and solid as its form hardened. The image was of a green painted, wooden mask with a metal bar running halfway down its face which had an almost irritating expression of amusement on it.

"Loookiiiiii..." said a soft, ghostly, feminine voice.

"Who said that?" Knuckles looked around in panic for the source of the voice, though deep down he knew where it was coming from. He'd never know the Master Emerald to do something like this, it was really full of surprises. "Loki? Who is Loki?" he asked.

"Loki!" the voice repeated and the image of the mask became even stronger. "Mask... Loki..."

"What do you mean?" Knuckles didn't understanding what the voice meant. "You want me to find Loki?

"the Maaask" the voice said.

"The Mask?…" Knuckles gazed at the picture he was being shown of a mask "You want me to find that mask?"

"The Mask!" the voice repeated, why couldn't it tell him anything?

Suddenly the picture vanished in a puff of green to be replaced by a scene from somewhere in the world. It showed a boat of some kind, a very long boat with a massive mast and large sail. It was occupied by several strong looking men and one frail old, woman. The boat beached on land just below a cliff face and they got out. The men were very strong looking and were all wearing very primitive clothes and carried very heavy looking battle gear and wore helmets of worn metal with horns sticking out the sides. Between two of them they carried a chest which bore a face similar to the mask Knuckles had seen just a moment before. The men spoke in a language he didn't understand but when they dug a deep hole in the rough beach sand and dumped the chest down into it and started to bury it, it became obvious they were trying to get rid of something.

The old woman then spoke, though he couldn't understand her words it did sound like she was casting a spell and one word kept being spoke, one word Knuckles understood perfectly. The word was 'Loki' though the meaning of the word still escaped him.

The scene shifted again to a city, a very dirty looking, polluted city. The scene changed again. A diver underwater was trying to break open the lock off a chest, the same chest Knuckles had just seen buried. As the lock broke something slashed into the water and crushed the diver underneath it. The object, which looked like a long pipe, impacted the side of box and it popped open, and from it emerged a great deal of bubbles trapped in there for centuries but what also floated out of it was the wooden Mask.

What did this all mean? Why did everything around here have to be so cryptic?

The scene shifted yet again. A small apartment somewhere in a city Knuckles guessed, one with a whirling green tornado shifting inside it, swinging uncontrollably from one side to the other scattering papers and scaring a dog into running under a bed. The spinning came to a stop revealing a man of average height with a big, green head, wide eyes and a broad smile showing a pair of massive, white teeth. He also had no visible ears. Was that supposed to be Loki?

"SSSsssssMOKINNN'!" the figure said in plain English for once.

The scene shifted again, a tall column of black smoke with violent electrical discharges running over it parted to reveal a tall man in a ripped tuxedo, muscles that bulged out everywhere, including his neck which snapping his collar. Like the other guy he had a big green head and no ears, except this guy had dark brown hair.

The scene shifted a number of times showing a range of people with big green heads and mischievous, sometimes insane, looks on their faces. Men, woman, kids, even dogs. After several scene shifts the green heads suddenly started appearing on creatures he recognised. A pink furred hedgehog with a red dress who was running very, very fast, a dreaming look in her eyes. Then a green headed fox with spiked up hair in a black jacket with an insane look in his eyes. The last one was of another hedgehog, blue fur like another hedgehog he knew, only this one had a big green head, long white quills that were almost glowing, big red eyes, wearing a black leather jacket.

"Huh, I don't understand?" Knuckles said impatiently "Do I have to find one of those people to find that mask?"

"Mask…" the voice struggled to say "Mask... of… Loki..."

The picture still showed the green hedgehog who was fast running through the forest, very fast in fact, it looks like Sonic's got another rival it seemed. Who was that anyway? The hedgehog suddenly put his breaks on and screeched to a halt.

What Knuckles was seeing now was odd. It was a picture of the green headed hedgehog looking at the Master Emerald! No, looking at Knuckles! Looking at Knuckles looking into the Master Emerald looking at the green hedgehog!

Immediately Knuckles spun around to face him. "Who are you?" he demanded holding up his hands ready for a fight, because Knuckles was always ready for a fight.

"I'm surprised you've forgotten, Knuckles the Echidna" the hedgehog said while he poked into his ear and swivelled his finger before pulling out a large wad of ear wax, a wad so large Knuckles eyes grew wide at the sight of it.

"How do you know my name?" he shouted in outrage. But then he remembered what the Master Emerald had just shown him. This guy could be the key to finding that mask. "You have something I need to find!"

"Really, what?" the hedgehog put his hands behind his head and leaned back into them as if he was leaning against an invisible wall. But before Knuckles could answer the hedgehog spoke again "You know dreadlocks are out this season!"

"You have a mask that I need to find, where is it?" he demanded batting away the flippant remark. The hedgehog's face at first looked surprised but suddenly became very serious, almost accusing.

"and what do you want it for?" he raised an eye brow.

"I...I don't know" Knuckles answered, he only knew what the Master Emerald spoke to him about it, he didn't know what he even had to do with it.

"Then why do you want it?" the guy said lacing his fingers and cracking his knuckles very loudly, so loud it disturbed a bunch of birds resting in a nearby tree.

"I don't know" Knuckles answered again.

"So let me get this straight!" he said now giving Knuckles an unimpressed look "You want an item in my possession and the reason you want said item escapes you completely? You're weird."

"The Master Emerald told me to track down this 'Mask... of Loki' that you have." Knuckles explained.

The hedgehogs body language suddenly became very sloppy, almost drunk and... Knuckles must be seeing things because before his eyes the green guy's quills had grown longer so that they snaked down his back and his leather jacket had became knee length and had changed to a softer, blue material. He also sprouted a triangular like hat on his head from nowhere and grew some thin stubble over his chain in a matter of seconds. Then when the hedgehog spoke he used a drunken sounding English accent.

"A mask, you say? Ah well thee said person who has the said mask will only give it up to another person who so wants it for a reason that is otherwise for the sake of having said Mask. If said person who wants said Mask were to give a reason other than for the sake of having it then I may concede to allowing said person to gain ownership of said object of desire!"

He was talking and was dressed like that drunk pirate from that stupid pirate movie Knuckles realised, and like the guy in the film he just talked absolute nonsense, but Knuckles thought he got the gist of it.

"So... What? You mean if I have a good reason you'll give me the mask?"

The hedgehog put his hands on his hips and sighed deeply with an unimpressed look. "You're not making any sense at all."

There was something in this hedgehogs behaviour that Knuckles recognised but he just couldn't put his finger on it, almost as if they had met before, a long time ago.

"Are you Loki?" Knuckles suddenly asked him.

"Aye, so its names you're after now? What's in it for me for yelling ya?"

"Stop playing games, green face!" Knuckles said clenching his fists tightly as anger flooded his system. "And cut it out with that stupid voice!"

"Oooh, you've got anger management issues" the hedgehog grinned again with his accent was back as it originally was "Well being stuck on an island alone you're bound to go a little crazy, and lonely. You should get out more, see the world, meet people, talk to some girls."

"Be quiet" Knuckles said, but the hedgehog's mouth just kept going.

"That's what you need, a girlfriend! What sort of girl would suit you I wonder." The hedgehog rubbed his chin and tapped his foot in thought. Knuckles wondered if he was being irritating deliberately to get his goat? Because it was working!

"CAN IT!" Knuckles barked at him.

"What girl would suit you?" green head said looking Knuckles up and down "I know, a blind one!"

"SHUT-UP!" Knuckles bellowed one word at a time his fists now shaking with fury. The hedgehog stopped and with a look of indifference just folded his arms over his chest and didn't speak. After a few seconds Knuckles opened his mouth to speak again but the hedgehog got in there first.

"Do you fancy Rogue, Knux?" that was it!

"WILL YOU SHUT UP ALREADY!" he shouted at the top of his voice, and the hedgehog immediately shut his mouth again. In fact he weirdly did more than just that. He held up left hand in front of him as if to hold Knuckles back in case he charged him then placing his hand at the side of his mouth pulled it along his mouth mimicking zipping up his mouth, only he didn't mimic it, he really did it! A zipper appeared on his mouth and he zipped it shut so now he couldn't speak, and neither could Knuckles at first after seeing that but at least the annoying green headed freak was being quiet.

"Now, where is this mask thing?" Knuckles asked calmly holding back the pent up annoyance he so wanted to release.

"Mphmble Mhphemlelabm" the hedgehog mumbled through his zipped up mouth.

"Stop playing around!" Knuckles said his fury rising again but the hedgehog only continued to mumble and gestured with his hands that Knuckles had 'told him to shut up so that's what he was doing.' Knuckles couldn't stand it anymore, his anger was at bursting point. "THAT'S IT!"

Knuckles drew back his right arm and thrust himself forward with such speed so when his attack landed it'd inflict a lot of damage on the hedgehog and knock some sense into him, but the moment before the punch made contact the hedgehog vanished! No, wait, he'd just sidestepped out of the way very quickly causing Knuckles to not only miss but hit a crumbling stone pillar that was behind him. A stone pillar that shook with the impact and slowly began to crack and fall. Knuckles didn't have time to get out of the way or even yelp in surprise as a heavy load of bricks crumbled and landed on top of him.

Pain wracked his head, but he pushed it aside as he dug himself out of the pile of stone that now covered him.

"That hit you like a ton of bricks" the hedgehog quipped -having unzipped his mouth- before he spun around on his heels and began walking straight towards the still glowing Master Emerald "Wow, I've never noticed how pretty this thing is when it glows like that."

"IF YOU LAY ONE FINGER ON THAT EMERALD..." Knuckles warned. The hedgehog rose one hand and reached out towards the Master Emerald while at the same time he raised a finger of his other hand to his lips to shush Knuckles "SHHH..." and said slowly "I am about to defy you."

The hedgehog firmly placed a hand on the surface of the Master Emerald, and within seconds the space between his hand and the Emerald began to smoke wildly with a hissing noise and immediately the green headed freak removed his hand and yelled at the top of his voice.

"EEEEEYOOOOWWWWWW!" he screamed jumping up and down on the spot blowing on his burning red hand. Why had the Master Emerald done that? Knuckles wondered, if it could do that all the time then there'd be hardly any reason for him to guard it. "Man, that is one HOT gem!" the hedgehog said waving his hand up and down to cool it off.

Getting to his feet a little dusty and bruised but not hurt, Knuckles started do advance on the green hedgehog again but he the mischievous guy looked unconcerned, he yawned and said "Sorry Knucklehead! I'm bored now and I've got better things to do before day break! I'll leave you to guard your 'Master Gem of Chaos'"

"It's called the Master Emerald!" Knuckles fumed.

"Whatever!" the hedgehog dusted his arms down and his pirate outfit dissolved back to his original leather jacket. "Knucklehead!" he said now focusing all his attention on Knuckles and adopting that stupid pirate-y voice again "Today will be the day you will always remember, as the day you almost caught…" he suddenly grinned widely with a wild look in his eyes "...ME!"

Knuckles hardly registered it when the green hedgehog vanished and zoomed off past the speed of sound before he could blink.

"COME BACK HERE" Knuckles shouted after him "WHERE IS THE MASK?"

The just as suddenly, the green faced hedgehog was back and within touching distance, right up in his face, he continued to grin wildly as he said still in that stupid pirate accent "The Mask?… I'm wearing it, mate! Savvy?"

"Huh?" was all Knuckles could utter before this insane creature zoomed off again into the night.

* * *

**To Be continued...**

* * *

**Authors notes:** I've decided that Sonic's Mask –Static- in the previous chapter wasn't working out as well as I had hoped so in this one I've added some extra layers to him, basing his personality a little more on the Loony Tunes character Bugs Bunny with a hint of the Catherine Tate character Lauren Cooper, a troublemaking, chav schoolgirl.

What Knuckles see's in the Master Emerald is a deleted scene from the original Mask movie which showed the origins of the Mask, it was sadly never used in the final cut. Knuckles also saw cameos of Stanly Ipkiss's Mask and Dorian Tyrell's Mask. I didn't describe any scenes from Son of the Mask because I'm honestly thinking of disregarding it as cannon to this story (mostly because the film was terrible, secondly because it explained away the mystery behind the Mask a little too much –something you should never do fully with a good mystery-. There are countless other reasons but I'll just list those two as the main ones.)

The character Sonic imitates to Knuckles is Captain Jack Sparrow from Pirates of the Caribbean. (Out of all the masks I've written in this story so far I don't think I've had the characters do an imitation of someone recognisable, so here's one:D)

Because of what I made 'Tailspin' do in a previous chapter I've upgraded the story to a T but holded off an M rating because I dont think I've gone that far, and I never intend to.


	10. The God of Mischief

**Chapter 9**

**Act 3**

**The God of Mischief**

Robotnik lay in his chair panting like a steam engine. He ached in several places after being left on that treadmill to run for 2 hours, 2 HOURS! He ached in places he didn't even know he had and worse of all he didn't look any slimmer. They say after exercise you ache because you use muscles you haven't used in years, why exercise those muscles? Let them die they're useless to him!

He'd flopped into his chair and fell asleep, but was rudely awaken when the chair finally gave way under his weight which did nothing to help his bad mood or his aching back. Retrieving a new chair he set about a new mission. Find that green headed freak!

Sitting on his computer console was Metals head, a couple of wires snaked out of its neck and connected into the underside of the console so Robotnik could access the robots memory databank. But annoyingly all data was corrupted but could be recovered, it only needed to be decrypted but that would take hours considering there was still stuff in there from when Metal first battled Sonic at Never Lake, the round scientist had never thought to upload or empty any of the old data since then.

Meanwhile he was bringing up all CCTV footage he had from every spy bot he had on the planet and played back the last hours before and after that rodent showed his green face in his base. Oddly he could not find any footage of this 'Static' person before he entered the base, in fact he could not find any at all even from years back, it was as if Static didn't exist until recently. But he did find plenty of footage in the hours after he attacked Metal. One of his spy bots showed the hedgehog on Angel Island arguing and trying to irritate Knuckles.

It was interesting though that Static appeared to have the power to alter his physical appearance and warp reality to his will, fascinating. Though Robotnik was irritated at the rodent he couldn't help but smile at how he pushed Knuckles buttons and manipulate him through insults to get him to attack a pillar that consequentially fell on him and such. Robotnik hated to admit it but he liked this guys style even if the rodent did just humiliate him. Another interesting point he noted was that when Static touched the Master Emerald he yelped in pain as if he'd burnt his hand, it's never done that before, but what caught his attention was the one statement or mention of one object, Knuckles referred to something called the 'Mask of Loki'.

"Mask of Loki?" Robotnik questioned "Computer!" He ordered "Find any information relating to this 'Mask of Loki'"

"Searching databank" the computer said in a monotone, it didn't take long to get an answer "No data found."

"No data found?" Robotnik cried getting up and slamming his fists onto the desk "What do you mean no data found? I have the biggest databank in the world how can I not have any information about it?"

"... No data found" the computer confirmed.

"Hmm. Okay if you can't find this Mask of Loki thing, tell me who or what Loki is or was" Robotnik asked, it didn't take long for the computer to come up with another answer.

"Information found" A lot of text turned up on the screen but Robotnik didn't have time to read pages of text so luckily the computer read it out for him. "Loki, god of the Norse men was considered the god of fire and the evil Lord of mischief, he caused much trouble among his godly cousins."

"A Norse god of mischief? Interesting" Robotnik grinned broadly "What was Loki capable of?" he asked pressing his fingers together, the computer replied.

"Loki was capable of warping reality to his will, the ability to shape shift and conjure objects from nothing"

"Reeeallly?" Robotnik said as he stroked his long moustache his grin widening, he's got him! "Confirm, was green headed creature who was in here Loki, God of Mischief?"

The computer thought for a moment before saying "Uncertain".

"Uncertain, how can you be uncertain? Is he or isn't he Loki?" Robotnik fumed "Uncertain" the computer repeated.

"You mean you can't tell me if this guy was Loki or someone?" Robotnik asked rhetorically, but the computer took it as a command because it started searching again.

"Match found!" it said and produced quite a lot of data, pages and pages of the stuff which was unexpected, usually only his greatest enemies had the privilege of having so much information logged about them. "Probability of the creatures identity being Sonic the Hedgehog 95% certain"

"Sonic?" Robotnik asked, he paused for a moment to let this sink in before he spoke again "Don't be ridicules, Sonic's my enemy I know him far too well. He wouldn't just break down my doors and come after me unless I was up to something, I wasn't up to anything and he never delivers my robots back to my doorstep, and he never tries to make irritating rhymes."

"Probability of the creature identity being Sonic the Hedgehog 95% certain" the computer repeated.

"95% you're saying, why not 100%?" Robotnik asked and the computer just repeated "Probability of the creature identity being Sonic the Hedgehog 95% certain"

This was off, his computer was the most advanced computer on the planet how could it make such a stupid mistake. No way was that creature Sonic the Hedgehog, impossible, it was a ludicrous thought but the more he thought about it the less it sounded crazy.

* * *

Knuckles walked through the forest the cool night air helped him think. He'd left Angel Island in pursuit of this mysterious Mask of Loki, whatever the heck that was. Though being away from the Master Emerald did worry him slightly he had a duty to find out what the Master Emerald was warning him about. He worried about leaving the giant gem on its own in times like this because there was always a risk someone else would find it and steal it. It was a slim chance however because even if someone managed to find the elusive, floating Angel Island and land on it, it wouldn't be likely they'd have the equipment or the strength that he himself possessed to lift and carry it away.

Knuckles however knew how to find the Island time and again because he had a keen insight into treasure hunting, and when he wanted to find Angel Island again then he'll find it.

His thoughts turned back to the task at hand. There was obviously some connection between that wooden mask and those creatures he saw in the Master Emerald, the ones that appeared to have green, rubber heads, especially that blue and green hedgehog. There was something still very familiar about that guy that he just couldn't put his finger on.

He glanced up at the horizon, sun up would be in fifteen minutes he guessed, that will make his hunt for this object easier. Where to start though? Usually he looks for clues and leads wherever he could find them and the most promising lead was again that blue hedgehog with the rubber face. Problem was he was fast, very fast, there was no way he could catch him. He stopped for a moment and considered.

Should he ask Sonic for help catching this guy? Sonic had a competitive streak so he'll defiantly want to face off with this guy by racing him and knowing Sonic either through skill or luck –mostly luck- he'll catch him, then Knuckles can get some information out of the guy. In the back of his head he could feel his brain make a connection. Sonic was blue and a hedgehog and could run very fast, and Knuckles was looking for a blue hedgehog that looked very similar and could run very fast only wearing a rubber, green mask.

The connection was made, but he dismissed it. Sonic could run fast and was a wise-guy but he could not change his appearance like the counterpart could and Sonic did not do impressions and as far as Knuckles knew, he could not act. Also that smirk the green guy had looked unnerving and creepy, which was very unlike Sonic.

"Nah!" he shrugged dismissing the thought all together.

"Hey Knucklehead!" called a voice and Knuckles swung himself around, he knew that voice, it was that rubber faced hedgehog!

"You again!" he called, the hedgehog was sitting halfway up a tree, leaning against the trunk while sitting on a branch, one of his legs lay across the branch while his other leg dangling beneath him.

"Where's the Mask?" the Echidna called up to him again.

"Still haven't figured it out yet Dreadlocks?" the green guy taunted.

"I don't have dreadlocks!" Knuckles fumed, "and figured what out?"

The hedgehog leaping down onto the ground and tried to snake an arm around Knuckles shoulders like they were old friends, but Knuckles pushed it away. The hedgehog looked a little bored with this. "Hey Einstein" the hedgehog said as he reached out and rapped sharply on the Echidna's head to Knuckles annoyance. "Can I borrow that brain of yours? Because you're clearly not using it!"

Clearly the hedgehog expected Knuckles to lash out because the moment that line was out of his mouth he took off into the dark trees and vanished at the speed of light. Knuckles didn't lash out, though he would have if that rubber head would stay still for just two seconds. He considered following for a moment but decided it wasn't worth it, because for one he was too fast and second Knuckles treasure hunting instincts suddenly became active, and they were pointing him in pretty much the same direction as the one 'rubber head' had just ran off in.

For some reason though Knuckles didn't hurry, he didn't seem to need to hurry because his instincts told him he would have plenty of time.

* * *

Sonic felt like he was drifting, drifting in a void, he could see nothing, feel nothing, hear nothing. What was going on? He looked left, then right but all he could see was pitch blackness in all directions. He took a step forward and didn't hear any impact of his soles on the floor. Was he falling?

The blackness wasn't blackness at all but more like a great black cloud, he could see it swirling like smoke around him. Sonic wanted to run, to see if he could find an edge to this place but oddly though he wanted to do this his body wasn't responding, it was as if it had a mind of its own because it was walking in a particular direction and no matter how hard he tried to change that direction his legs wouldn't respond.

"You know why I have called you here?" said a voice, a deep, booming voice like its speaker held great power.

"Not particularly" Sonic said but he didn't say it in his own voice! His voice sounded slightly older and uninterested in what the other voice was saying. Plus that wasn't what he was going to say anyway.

"You have caused one too many problems in our realm" the booming voice said and through the mist Sonic could see the vague outline of a tall man, heavily built with what looked like a raven on each shoulder and a large orange moustache, was that Eggman? "We have shown leniency towards you in the past because you have aided us time and again. But recently your acts have become more random and destructive." That didn't sound like Eggman at all, he sounded more... sane.

"I have better things to do then listen to this, Odin" Sonic felt his mouth say as his body crossed its arms over his chest. So that guy was someone called Odin who for some reason chose to come in the guise of that egghead Robotnik, why do all mythical characters he meets take the image of someone he knows?

"This is not a simple meeting of the elders of Valhalla, Loki!" the powerful man bellowed. Why had Odin just called him Loki? Sonic wondered. "It has been decided, you are too unpredictable, too uncontrollable, and therefore..." Odin paused before saying "we banish you!"

"What?" Sonic's mouth said in shock and surprise. It was as if Sonic was the Loki himself, or inside his head or sharing his thoughts or something like that. "You can't do this to me! I am Loki, I am the God of fire"

"You are an abomination!" Odin screamed "You misuse your powers and lead mortals and gods alike astray with your ways, if you are the god of anything it is mischief!"

"What could I have possibly have done to deserve this?" Loki asked innocently through Sonic's mouth.

"You killed Balder!" Odin bellowed. Loki paused for a moment before answering "Okay, there was that." Then he quickly added "But Hod was the one who threw the killing blow..." Odin cut him off "You tricked Hod! It is the judgement of this council that Balders death was by your hand! For this you will be stripped of your powers and exiled to the mortal realm. You will be sealed under the earth for all eternity bound by the intestines of your ill fated children." _That was going overboard a little _Sonic thought.

Though all he could see was vague mist figures Sonic saw the smoky figure of Odin rise taller and loomed over him.

"No!" Sonic heard his voice scream "You can't do this to me! You can't do this... IT'S NOT FAIR!"

"You've brought this upon yourself Loki!" Odin cried as he raised his hands. Sonic felt himself slowly back away in disbelief. "NO... NO!" He felt himself fall back and crawl a little ways until he felt a solid wall at his back all the while his eyes didn't leave the giant smoky Odin/Eggman figure bearing down on him. Sonic/Loki clawed at the solid wall in desperation as if trying to dig his way out. "NO... NO...NO!" he heard the voice his mouth was making start to whimper. Odin lowered his hands to point at him and prepared to cast whatever spell he was about to perform. Sonic felt his head being tucked towards his stomach and his hands rose over his head to shield himself. But nothing came, no strike, no zap, nothing. Sonic just felt nothing at all.

All the mists had vanished leaving him only in blackness. He was now laying on his back on a soft surface. After a few moments he realised why everything looked so black, his eyes were closed and they felt very, very heavy as he opened them. He closed them very quickly when he was blinded by a bright light above him.

He took a deep breath and cool air filled his lungs. What a weird dream he'd had. What's happened to him? OUCH! A bolt of pain surged across his brain, only now did he realise he had one mother of a headache and when he moved his arms to hold his aching head he realised how tired he felt.

He didn't want to get up, it was that sort of tiredness when you just wanted to continue sleeping. He just wanted to laze around in his bed all day. But wait this wasn't his bed, what he was laying on felt too hard and felt like it was grass and just a little ways away he could hear the clear sound of running water, a river?

Slowly he opened his eyes, light streamed into his eyes and felt like it was piercing right to the back of his head but he forced them to stay open.

He was outside in the morning light, the sun almost directly above him. He shut his eyes again and took another deep breath of cool air, then another, then another which gradually woke him up but the more his senses came back to him the more he preferred he was still unconscious. His entire body was aching like he'd pushed it to the peak of its performance and just kept on going, it felt like it had been over worked.

He let the hand holding his head flop back down by his side and as it did it brushed against something. At first Sonic thought it was just a rock but as he felt it, it's shape and texture it triggered a very clear memory, it was that Mask!

With that realisation Sonic's eyes snapped open despite the headache he was getting. He was about to get up when another of his senses kicked into action, his taste buds, and he nearly gagged and screamed at the same time. His tongue was on fire!

Quickly he leapt up to his feet despite his fatigue and aching body, quickly ran towards the flowing river and dunked his head sharply under the water and took a grateful gulp of water to cool down his burning tongue.

He raised his head back out of the water feeling more awake now thanks to that. What the heck did he do last night? He remembered that mask, he remembered it fell on his face and infused him with a strange sort of energy that drastically altered him in many ways, including his sense of judgement. He remembered taking Metal apart –when did Robotnik put that old junk pile back together again anyway?- He also remembered making Robotnik run, suggesting a date with Amy –did he really do that?- then he messed with Knuckles a little but after that it'd all just faded to black and he woke up here. He must've done more than that though because he didn't remember passing out at all.

Sonic turned and spotted the Mask laying in the dew covered grass in the shadows of dozens of trees. He was in some kind of forest clearing, but exactly where he was he didn't know. He walked over to the Mask and picked it up, this time he knew he didn't imagine anything. It had transformed Tails like it had transformed Amy when she put it on and, then it transformed himself when it fell on his face. Unbelievable that this small piece of junk could infuse someone with such power, not even the Chaos Emeralds allowed him to warp and twist reality like he did and they didn't affect his judgement while using them.

Though it was fun to have those powers and do what he did it had to come to an end sometime, and like with Amy the Mask had detached itself after a short time. Something in Sonics mind clicked, the Mask detached from Amy with the rising sun, when Sonic tried it on during midday it wouldn't work, then at night it did work and later it had come off his own face at dawn. Maybe that was it, it must only work at night, why only night he didn't know but that's what it seemed to be.

Pain suddenly shot across his stomach and Sonic dropped the Mask and nearly fell over in pain. He shut his eyes tightly. It was agony! It felt like one of his ribs was broken. Sonic opened his left eye a little and peered at the Mask looking back up at him from the ground. Last night while wearing that thing Metal had crashed into him with enough force to break his own ribs, yet he'd felt nothing at the time. Was this some sort of delayed affect? If so then why wasn't Amy in pain after she'd worn it? She'd been totally flattened, survived and didn't complain afterwards.

He reached down, stuck his thumb and fore finger into the Mask's eye holes and lifted it up again. While he was in this much pain he doubted he could run effectively if at all, but he had to get back to Tails' workshop because they'd be looking for him no doubt.

He was about to set off when another thought came to him, it was a question. He looked around the tall trees and the running water. The question was, where the hell was he?

Movement came as some bushes began to rustle at the edge of the small clearing he was in. This was not good, Sonic didn't feel well enough to fight if whatever it was turned out to be hostile. A shape emerged from the bushes. It was Knuckles!

Sonic's mind flashed back to what he did and said to Knuckles last night while in the guise of his alter ego Static, though he wasn't concerned with it he didn't feel like having it out with Knuckles while he felt this lousy.

"Sonic?" Knuckles said in surprise

"Knucklehea..." he stopped himself in time "I mean... Knuckles!" Instinctively Sonic hid the Mask behind his back and wedged it between his quills to keep it in place.

"What are you doing here?" Sonic asked a little suspiciously.

"What happened to you? You look like road kill?" Knuckles said.

'_Oh, very funny! You're pretty uppity considering your species eats bugs all day!_' said a tetchy voice in Sonic's head. That was freaky, now he's hearing voices. He shook his head a little and thought for a second. "I slept outside last night."

Knuckles looked a little suspiciously at Sonic and he couldn't blame him, usually Sonic would come up with and speak a much cooler, smartallic reply then that though he didn't think Knuckles deserved the one he'd just come up with, not yet anyway.

"Sonic, you only live ten miles away, why sleep outside?" Knuckles said. Okay, so Sonic knew vaguely where he was, it shouldn't take him too long to get to Tails' workshop from wherever he was, but then again he didn't know what his top speed was in this condition.

"Did you sleep under a rock?" Knuckles asked when Sonic yawned deeply.

"No, I slept in a burrow like any other hedgehog" he sleepily snapped. "Shouldn't you be guarding that Master Emerald of yours like you do all day?" Usually when Sonic spoke like this to Knuckles the Echidna would lose his temper and try to hit him, but instead Knuckles either had something else on his mind or he was looking at Sonics very fatigued form with pity. He opened his mouth to speak but the echidna closed it again before deciding to say something else "You should go home and get some sleep."

'_...and you should get a life!' _that voice in Sonic's head wanted him to say, either to say '...and y_ou should get yourself girlfriend'_, and almost did if his fatigue wasn't getting in the way.

"Yeah, maybe I should?" Sonic said taking a step while holding his aching side.

"Wait." Knuckles said as Sonic tried to limp away. Had he seen the Mask wedged between his quills? "Have you ever heard of something called 'The Mask of Loki'?"

"The what of what?" Sonic asked turned his back away from Knuckles so he couldn't see the wooden mask. But Knuckles just sighed "Oh, never mind. I've got work to do."

'_Still hunting for a brain?'_ said that voice in Sonic's head, what was with these thoughts he was having? It was like there was someone on his wavelength but with an attitude much worse than his own –and it's been said he had a bad attitude- inside his head.

Sonic slowly backed away until he couldn't see Knuckles anymore then he turned around and began limping away. This limp was his top speed, about point one miles per hour. He reached behind his back and retrieved the Mask from its hiding place and looked at it long and hard. _What the heck has this thing done to me?_

* * *

Tails and Amy had returned to Tails' workshop since their quest to hunt down Sonic seemed to come to nothing. Amy prided herself on having a built in Sonic detector but finding him now was like trying to find a stick of hay in a large collection of needles, or trying to find that missing, matching sock, or finding a Hollywood movie producer with ideas of his own, it was just impossible.

Tails was continually beside himself with worry but Amy couldn't understand what was wrong. Sonic had just asked her out, that was a wonderful thing to her. Every time she's tried to suggest it to him he pretends he has an appointment or something like that. She'd asked him if he wanted to go ice skating and he said he didn't know how to skate when she knew full well he could. It was the same excuse when she asked him to go to the beach, he said he couldn't swim! Oh no, wait he can't swim, that was true. But it hardly mattered anymore because this time Sonic had done the asking, not her. Oh her heart was a flutter and she was just waiting for the call, or maybe she should call him? No, no, leave it for a while, she didn't want to come across as desperate after all.

"Sonic's been everywhere!" Tails said in astonishment as he clicked on his computer.

"He's the fastest hedgehog alive, of course he's been everywhere." Amy said snapping out of her daydream and moved to stand next to Tails.

"Everywhere in one night?" Tails said clicking and bringing up several pictures from all over the world of Sonic in different locations. Hanging off the minute hand of Big Ben -apparently the moment before he broke it clean off- launching himself off Blackpool Tower taking its top off in the process, grinding down the Eifel Tower wearing it down so much as to make it stand at an angle, straightening up the Leaning Tower, speeding along the 'Great Wall', left a mile long skid mark through the Nazca lines. These were only the pictures that had the Masked Sonic in them, there were loads that Tails guessed were the result of Sonic or Static himself, one even showed a hedgehog shaped hole going straight through the base of the Matterhorn.

"He said he liked to travel" Amy shrugged.

"But Sonic would never do this." Tails argued "He wouldn't deface monuments like this unless he had to. It's not Sonic doing this, it's that Mask."

"Why are you so worried about that Mask? It's not like Robotnik has it or anything, Sonic's the one who's wearing it." Amy said. Tails sighed deeply like there was a heavy weight in his chest.

"I don't think Sonic is in total control of his actions, neither were you." He said and paused for a moment and his whiskers droop a little "and neither was I" he said the last words very heavily.

"What do you mean?" she asked concerned somehow sensing whatever Tails was about to say it was really cutting into him.

"Nothing" Tails said glancing back at the screen "We have to find Sonic, fast."

"You've found him!" said a familiar voice from the open doorway. Light poured from the door casting the hedgehog in a dark silhouette against the setting sun and as he limped inside the form of Sonic the Hedgehog, the original Sonic was revealed.

"SONIC!" Amy squealed and instinctively flung herself forward to wrap her arms around him in a full embarrassing hug. Her arms wrapped around him tightly and Sonic yelped loudly "AHHGA! GET OFF ME!" he yelled. Amy immediately released him, he'd never spoken so bluntly to her before, didn't he like her anymore?

Giving him space she noticed why he'd yelled, the way he was holding himself gave away the image of someone who was deep in pain. "Sonic, are you alright?"

"Nah, it's just a scratch." He said dismissively as he held his side tightly.

"Don't be silly, you need to rest!" Amy said sternly and roughly pulled Sonic to a nearby, comfy looking chair and forced him to sit down despite the pain he was obviously feeling as she did this.

With his hand still wrapped around his waist he raised his other hand and placed that ugly looking, wooden mask on the bench, the ugly looking, wooden mask that was causing so many problems.

"Sonic, are you okay?" Tails asked.

"I said I'm fine!" he snapped at the fox.

"No, I mean are you feeling alright up here" he said tapping the side of his own head.

"I must've blacked out, but I know I was totally whacked" Sonic said rubbing his eyes "I remember going after Metal, I remember taking him apart and I remember playing around with Knuckles but after that I can't remember."

"Do you remember giving me your number?" Amy asked excitedly clasping her hands together. But annoyingly Sonic didn't answer her.

"You don't remember any of the other stuff?" Tails asked "Breaking Big Ben? Grinding down the Eifel Tower?" Sonic just looked at him with a blank face "Do you remember leaving a Sonic shaped hole in the Matterhorn? Eating a truck load of bread buns, hotdogs and chilli, separately?"

"That explains a lot" Sonic said shucking air though his mouth like he was lightly blowing on his tongues surface. "Did I really do all that?"

"We're not even halfway through the list!" Amy exclaimed.

"Aw, man" Sonic said rubbing his head a little "I don't remember."

As her hero stood there wounded and damaged she couldn't help her attention turn to the one thing that could've possibly hurt him so badly, that stupid mask.

She picked it up roughly as if it could actually feel it. "Did this thing to this to you, did it make you do those things?" she asked giving the mask a piercing glare.

"I think in a way..." it was Tails speaking "it was Sonic doing those things, but only partially."

"Huh?" was the only word Amy could think to use. Sonic didn't say anything and just watched as Tails thought how best to explain his ideas.

"Well..." thinking a little more he took a pen from his desk and a piece of paper and laid it down between Sonic and Amy so they could both see it. Tails drew a circle and divided it into three equal sections. He then made a dotted line following one of the divides between the sections until a dotted line cut the sphere in half.

"Our mind is made up of the subconscious and the conscious" he said labelling the top half of the circle conscious and the lower half subconscious. "The conscious is what we think and process while we're awake, the subconscious is like the dormant half of ourselves, sleeping but just as important to us for sorting the information our brain takes in."

He then began labelling the three sections of the divided circle. He wrote Super Ego, Ego and ID, ID, under the subconscious line, Super Ego above it and Ego in the section that spread over the conscious/unconscious line.

"The mind is further divided up into ID, Ego and Super Ego. When we have a desire, hunger for example" he tapped his pen at the ID section "the ID is the source of it, it decides we are hungry but apart from that it doesn't know how to fulfil the craving. It passes the decision onto the Ego that interprets the need into a plausible way to stop you eating paper or safety pins and things like that. So say it decides you want a chilidog, the thought is then passed onto the Super Ego, the most conscious part of the three and it's then up to you how to get that chilidog. Do you steal it? Make it? Buy it? Depending on the sort of person you are."

Amy wasn't following a word of this, she wasn't very good at science stuff in school but Sonic kindly helped her out with.

"He's saying our mind has layers and our inner desires bubble up through the different layers until a decision is made on it." Oh, Sonic could be so smart at times.

"That's not exactly it but if it helps" Tails asked a little crestfallen his own explanation was hard to follow. "Try to see the ID, Ego and Super ego like three different people. This is how I learned it. The ID says, 'I'm hungry, give me something to eat, I want it now and I don't care how I get it' the Ego then says 'Wait, let me think this through' while the Super Ego says 'Okay, but let me think of a way to do it."

"Yeah, I followed that" Amy said catching on. Why do brainy people have to make things so complicated? "But what does this have to do with this thing?" she said holding the mask up again.

"Well" Tails said looking at the mask like it was an icky spider about to land on him, he didn't seem comfortable with it until Amy lowered it out of his sight. "The Mask does this" and using his pen he struck a cross through the sections marked Super Ego and Ego. "I think it somehow bypasses the Super ego and the Ego and gives the ID full control of all of our decision making, which is why we lose it while wearing it."

"Who lost what?" Amy asked a little confused. She was only brought into this recently though she remembered the Mask when it fused to her pretty little face but she didn't feel like she acted in anyway weird at all. Okay maybe a little.

"Well, take Sonic." Tails said turning to look at the injured hedgehog "You ate a truckload of bread buns, hot dogs and chilli separately. You were hungry and your ID said 'find something to eat', you like chilidogs but it couldn't process how to make it or where to get it from so it made you steal it from the back of trucks, and ate the ingredients separately not because it's stupid but because it simply doesn't care."

Tails then turned to Amy "And as for Amy. The ID deals with all kinds of primeval desires including the one for..." he paused for a moment before muttering the word "procreation" under his breath "Your obsession with Sonic drove you to... do what you did."

"Hey!" Amy said a little annoyed "I don't have an obsession with Sonic!" she said "That's making me sound like a stalker!" out of the corner of her eye, though she saw it she didn't take notice of Sonic rolling his eyes. "And what about you anyway? What did your IP make you do?"

"ID" Tails corrected and immediately looked ashamed with himself. It was a look that just made Amy's anger melt away. _What? What did he do?_ "I won't pretend I don't feel a little resentment and repressed anger at what certain bullies have done to me." He sighed "But with the ID free so is all the emotional baggage you carry around. It just floated up in front of me and I had no choice, I had to act on it."

Tails glanced at Sonic and Amy followed his glance, the hedgehog was giving the fox a look which said 'Say no more, I understand' though Amy didn't understand herself. She opened her mouth to push the point but she caught a warning glare from Sonic and he shook his head. Since when did he give her warning glares?

"So..." she held up the magic piece of junk again "you mean this thing rummages in our heads, picks out our desires and brings them to the surface. What's with all the super powers?"

Tails shrugged. "I don't know. I can only guess why we all act differently under its influence. It's like asking why the Chaos Emeralds have such powers."

"Loki" Sonic suddenly said.

"Who?" Amy and Tails said together.

"Something Knuckles said to me." He looked up "It's a long story but Knuckles called it 'the Mask of Loki'"

"Loki?" Tails said rubbing his chin as if he recognised the word. He turned away and walked to a bookshelf.

"How do you know about all this Ego and ID stuff anyway?" Amy asked as Tails picked a book off the shelf and carried it back.

"I read this book" he said and placed the book on the table. The cover read 'The Masks we Wear. By Dr. Arthur C. Numan.' He opened it up and scrolled a cross the page. "I planned to build a fool proof lie detector but I needed to understand the mind to get it to work properly."

He scanned the pages until he found what he was looking for. A chapter about 'Parallels between the Psyche and ancient myths.' "Here it is" Tails said as he began to read.

"Loki was a god of the Norse people though his origins and story are different in each telling. Some called him the god of fire who fought on the side of the gods. Other sources called him a night god, a shape shifting trickster who tried to lead people astray and often to their death. He became known as the god of mischief and caused nothing but trouble for the gods of Valhalla. It wasn't until he tricked the blind god Hod into killing his twin Balder with a poison dart that the all father of the gods, Odin god of war, banished Loki forever from Valhalla to the mortal realm, stripping him of his powers and forever trapping him in an unbreakable prison, his bindings made from the intestines of his own children and poison dripping onto his face from an eternal serpent."

"Ew" Amy groaned at this. Thankfully Tails skipped ahead to cut out most of the unimportant and gory stuff.

"The Norse men who dreamed up Loki accidentally produced a creature that could be the most accurate representation of a pure ID. A creature of unstoppable, untameable desires that gets what it wants by fair or foul though mostly foul and would stop at nothing to quench these desires." Tails finished reading the passage.

"I guess this means it's called 'the Mask of Loki'" Tails said as he closed the book "because it turns us into what the Norse men think Loki was, an unstoppable creature only interested in quenching its desires and with godly powers to indulge its every whim."

* * *

Everything Tails had just read out sounded very familiar to Sonic, yet he couldn't think why. It was like something out of a dream, a dream where everything dissolves after you wake up.

Sonic tried to move and hissed loudly when his stomach ached.

"Sonic, did you hurt yourself?" Tails asked, there was no hiding it now, a large bruise had appeared on the left side of his torso.

"Last night, Metal hit me with a large kick when I was facing off against him in that Mask" Sonic explained.

"But if you're wearing the Mask you shouldn't have been able to feel pain" Tails said "I didn't feel anything and I've been bashed around."

"I didn't feel anything at the time, it was only after the Mask came off that I felt it" Sonic said as he let Tails gently remove Sonic's arm to reveal the extent of the bruise. "What gives anyway? How come you two aren't feeling any pain after wearing it?"

"I think the problem isn't physical buy psychological." Tails said as he crossed over to another bench and dug out a first aid kit. "You like danger and the thrill of surviving impossible odds, but with the Mask you feel like the odds are too much in your favour, you want the danger of being hurt but the Mask can't give you that, so I guess for you it interprets injuries into something real for when you take it off."

"Whoa, whoa!" Sonic said as Tails produced a bandage "You mean if I suffer a fatal injury while wearing the Mask then I'd be dead when it came off?"

"I don't know about dead, but it clearly granted your wish to be in danger." Tails explained as he began wrapping the bandage around Sonic's torso. He was dreading having to walk around in casts and bandages for weeks because it meant he couldn't do anything fun.

* * *

Amy was only half aware of the conversation going on in front of her because the rapidly lowering light from outside made Amy realise how pretty this Mask glistened. Like a perfectly cut diamond.

She wanted Sonic but Sonic never seemed to want her. He'd offered to take her out on a date but now he was ignoring her. Sonic liked her while he was wearing this mask, would it work the other way around?

"_With this Mask I could be with Sonic" _Said a tempting voice in her head "_With this mask I can go faster than he can, we could race each other or do stuff he thinks is fun."_ Though Amy did not want to wear this stupid thing the voice in her head had a point. "_Sonic could be mine! All I have to do is just put the Mask on" _The voice urged_ "Just... put... the Mask... on."_

* * *

"Where is the Mask?" Tails said "We should lock it up before it causes any other problems"

"It's OK Tails" Sonic said as he winced at how tight the bandages were "I think the Mask only works at night, that's why it didn't work when I tried it on yesterday." He winched slightly "But it's taken me a long time to get here in this condition."

"It's nearly sun down, we should lock it away now." Tails said as he tidied away his first aid kit "Before anyone else tries to put it on."

BANG! A great boom and a bright flash of green light shone from where Amy was standing, her entire body was glowing in an eerie green light as her hands held the Mask of Loki onto her face. Great gusts of wind were blasting out from her form as her clothes and hair rippled with the rushing air and the Masks form warped and stretched over her features.

"Oh, not good!" Sonic said as Amy's form was sent into a wild spin again before emerging as that other Amy, Amy Gaga his mind decided to call her. This time she'd changed her clothes, she wore a frock like dress over a white collar shirt, a loose tie that was tied very short, a tied cloth belt that enhanced her waistline and a pair of red high heel shoes. She looked at Sonic and stood in a pose that had the intention of making her look sexually attractive, though the image failed when she grinned with those baseball sized, tile white teeth that just made her look creepy. Her green eyes looked at Sonic in a way he didn't like, it was full of affection and warmth but also there was an unmistakable look of uncontrollable lust in them.

"Hi there Sweety!" Amy Gaga said and within a second she'd raced up to Sonic and hugged him tightly. "Oh, now you can be the Romeo to my Juliet, Clyde to my Bonny" she kicked his legs out from under him so she could lean him back while still in her arms and have herself loom over him a dreaming look in her eyes "the Leo Decapreo to my Kate Winslet." She added.

"Umm..." Sonic murmured "...I do feel like I'm on a sinking ship"

"We're gonna paint the town red tonight" she exclaimed and hugged Sonic tightly again, the hedgehog gasped for breath, if she squeezed any harder Tails' workshop will be painted red with his guts.

Amy loosened her grip on him but still held onto him firmly. "Now if I remember rightly, you offered to take me out on a date last night." She fluttered her eye lids.

"Not tonight" Sonic thought quickly "I'm injured"

"Don't worry" and Amy took both his wrists leaned as far back as she could and placed her foot on the right side of his body. What was she doing? "Now clench, because this might make your eyes water" Before Sonic could protest she extended her foot out as far as she could while at the same time pulling his arms out as far as they could and nearly ripped them off. What Sonic felt was a sharp pain but it quickly subsided, it actually felt good like when you stretch in the morning to loosen the body, when she stopped and let go Sonic panted and coughed to get air back into his lungs but he didn't feel hurt at all. In fact the bruise on his stomach was gone and his arms had stopped aching, he felt good, as good as new.

"Now" Amy said wrapping her arms around him again grinning with those big, white teeth "About that date"

"Umm, it wasn't exactly me who asked you" was all Sonic could say. Amy's features darkened and became she looked very annoyed. The pink hedgehog grabbed Sonic by the shoulders and pulled him so close her face was being pressed into his. "LISTEN BUSTER!" she hissed "YOU ASKED ME IF I'D GO ON A DATE WITH YOU, I'M CASHING IN NOW!"

Amy was bad enough following him around everywhere, Amy like this with this power was unbearable, why did Static the ID have to open his big mouth like that? "Technically the Mask asked you" Sonic quickly said but Amy wasn't going to fall for it.

"Oh, don't worry it can come along too" Amy's voice became softer, and seductive her arms snaking around his back again "and anyway I'm wearing it now, so it's the same difference."

"Amy!" Tails cried taking a few steps towards them "Didn't you hear me? The Mask is dangerous you have to UHGM" Tails mumbled when Amy quickly reached out with her right hand and clamped it over Tails mouth and looked irritatingly at Tails.

"Quiet you twin tailed freak! You're ruining the moment." Amy let go and focused her attention back onto Sonic.

"Amy!" Tails said again "It's..." ZIP! Tails stopped when his lips were sealed, literally by a zipper that had appeared on his lips and had zipped shut. A small clip had appeared making sure it stayed shut. Tails clawed at it trying to undo it but couldn't. Satisfied Amy turned back to Sonic.

"Now where were we Sweety?" Amy said. She kicked Sonic's legs out from under him so he lay in her arms again and pushed her lips onto his despite Sonic trying to fight her off. Maybe if it was actually Amy kissing him he wouldn't put up so much of a fight, but this wasn't really Amy and she didn't seem to care he was trying to get away.

Amy finally gave him his lips back and pressed her forehead against his "Let's go" she said stroking the quills at the back of his head "I've had this date planned out for years" and before Sonic could say anything she half carried half dragged him out the workshop door at the speed of light and Sonic could do nothing to resist.

* * *

**To be continued...**

* * *

**Authors notes:** I've been meaning to update for a while but unfortunately I've been very busy with work, Uni, the sprite series and other stuff so I hope this has been worth the wait. Plus I've been setting myself up on DeviantART, I'm under the same username if you want to check out my stuff. ;)

I've tried to explain again the Ego Super Ego and ID theory again if anyone didn't understand it the first time around.

I'm going to go back some time and change the chapter where Tails describes the machine he was building. I'm going to change it back to lie detector because I've decided the whole ID, Ego, Super Ego reading machine thing is rubbish.

I've given Amy a second shot with the Mask because the first time I didn't get to explore much of what she could've been. I've also nicknamed her Amy Gaga, after Lady Gaga. :D

Originally I wanted to release the next chapter about Amy Gaga and Sonic's 'date' in time for valentine's day, but due to what I've mentioned above its been delayed, but to make up for it I've drawn something on DeviantART some readers might like ;)

Also Amy Gaga's Mask costume is based off a fan drawing of the Masked Amy character by Death-Driver-5000 on DeviantART who has kindly given me permission to use the costume as her default look. So a big thanks to him.

Cheers and I hope you enjoyed the new chapter.


	11. First base

**Authors notes: **Wow, been a long while since I updated this story or any of my Fan fiction stories come to think of it. Anyway, I've got at least 2 updates for this story ready to go that I will release over the following weeks.

I also want to note that for the purposes of the story I've upped the characters ages. This is due to a later update where a specific joke/line sounds weird if the characters aren't older. So in this case Sonic would be 18, Tails 12, Amy 16, in other words all the characters have been aged at least 3 years. This was a creative choice to make certain character developments work. You'll recognise the line when you read it.

But anyway, on with the story. Its been so long I hope I haven't lost my touch. :D

-Enjoy

* * *

**Act 4**

**Chapter 10**

**First Base**

Okay, Sonic thought Amy was irritating and even slightly creepy due to her obsession with him. But this Masked Amy he'd decided to nickname 'Amy Gaga' was re-writing the book and made Amy appear timid and respectful. All night Amy Gaga had held onto him as if her own life had depended upon it. While Sonic had tried everything he could to escape her, she always found a way to drag him straight back either by simply appearing in front of him at the speed of light, somehow managing to get a fishing line around his waist or by making his feet stick to the floor using –what he guessed was- super glue, either way it meant Amy Gaga could always catch up with him and that was the most frightening thing about her though not the most disturbing.

She appeared so fed up with his attempts at escape that she'd magically produced a pair of handcuffs and cuffed herself to him. If Amy couldn't take a hint Amy Gaga didn't know he was giving them.

Right now though at least they weren't doing anything in particular, just sitting in a cinema which Amy Gaga had managed to force her way in past the ticket salesman –a grey cat- who tried to bar them entry, but Amy Gaga gave him a verbal threat by saying she'd 'turn him into a violin' if he interfered with her big date. The cat backed down and they had entered only to be blocked by two heavily built security guards, this wall was quickly removed by Amy Gaga and the pair were thrown out through the cinema doors and across the road before smacking into another building across the street. After that display everyone gave Amy a wide birth.

There were only a handful of movies on at this theatre, Dragon Ball Z the movie, Fast and the Furious 10, Top Gear the movie, the Hobbit, Mario and Luigi: the origins, and a few others, some things Sonic would happily sit down and watch but Amy Gaga decided to choose for him and there was a decision between Mamamia, 50 shade of gray and Barbie Girl –all chick flicks Sonic would rather fall into a coma than see, the best parts of those films were the end credits. Amy quickly settled on watching the movie Titanic in 3D. Not a film Sonic particularly despised but to him the film didn't get going until the ship hit the iceberg and even then it was filled with that pretty bad love story. Plus to add to the awkwardness of it she was technically showing a guy who can't swim a sinking ship with not enough lifeboats, but worst of all if the movie wasn't torture enough they would at some point be listening to 'My Heart will go on' _... someone please shoot me right now._

Amy Gaga reached into a popcorn bag she'd forced him to hold all through the movie and shovelled a handful of popcorn into her mouth. Amy Gaga wasn't just creepy and freaky, she was disgusting! She had no inhibitions at all! Then she curled her arms around him again like she'd somehow protect him from the movie.

It had gotten to the part where the two lovers on the ship spread their arms over the bow of the Titanic, the 'I'm flying' moment. "Oh wouldn't it be so romantic to actually do that?" she asked. Sonic rolled his eyes, he somehow had a feeling she was going to drag him to a ship somewhere when the film was over to do it.

"Lucky for everyone this didn't actually happen in real life!" she exclaimed. Sonic rolled his eyes again, Amy herself couldn't be that blond could she?

"Titanic actually happened" Sonic explained, and Amy Gaga's eyes lit up.

"Really, you mean there really was a real Titanic, and there was a real Jack and a real Rose?" she squealed, Sonic just rolled his eyes again and pressed his face into his palm at Amy's stupidity.

"SHHH!" someone in front of them hissed.

"SHHHH yourself!" Amy Gaga hissed back.

"SHHH!" someone to the left of them hissed

"You SHHH!" she shot back

"SHHHH!" someone else hissed. Sonic was aware veins in Amy Gaga's forehead were starting to pop up.

"QUIET, YOU'RE RUINING THE MOOD!" Amy shouted

"SHHH!" more people hissed at her. "Be quiet, we're trying to watch this, stop making noise!"

"FINE! YOU WANT NOISE I'LL GIVE YOU NOISE!" Reaching into her white shirt she pulled from it what looked like a small squeezable horn, like one from an old fashioned type car, on the squeeze bit were the words 'Please Squeeze me gently... NO I MEAN IT THIS TIME' she held it up at the rest of the audience "READY... STEADY..." and Amy did not squeeze gently. She flung her arms back and practically clapped it between her hands. The noise it created was deafening and the gale it somehow produced from its mussel made people fly backwards out of their chairs and it blasted all of them out the doors. Once the noise stopped she juggled the horn from one hand to the other a few times before shouting at them "NOW THAT WAS NOISE!" They continued to watch the movie in silence with no one else around them.

Once Sonic tried to get away from Amy by claiming he needed to use the little hedgehogs room, but Amy didn't just let him go she came with him and she paused the whole movie using a remote control she somehow had produced. She allowed Sonic some privacy and waited outside but refused to take the cuff off that bound them together. Instead she allowed her arm to stretch like elastic, when Sonic saw this creepy thing follow him in he quickly decided he didn't need to go anymore.

Within an hour Sonic was buried in white tissues, they weren't his they were just thrown onto him by Amy as she began crying buckets of tears, literally waterfalls of tears, when it came to the end of the movie, the ship went down and the guy had died in the freezing water. All the water from Amy's tears was collecting at the bottom of the theatre making it look like the cinema itself was sinking. But worst was that Amy Gaga kept blowing her nose and adding more tissues to the pile that covered Sonic, blissfully unaware she was covering her 'date' in a pile of snotty rags. Sonic could not feel more repelled by Amy Gaga and his tolerance of her was starting to wear thing very fast.

When they left the cinema Amy Gaga was just hysterical about the whole thing. The first thing she said to him when they left was "Oh, would you sacrifice yourself to save me like that?" she asked. Sonic didn't answer, only because he knew she wouldn't like the truth. She suddenly pulled on him and hugged his head to her chest. "I'd never, ever let you die like that, I'll protect you like you would protect me!" protect? If she didn't stop hugging him like this he was going to suffocate! Thankfully she did let him go but only so she could draw him into a kiss that threatened to suck his insides out. _Someone get me out of this or I'm going to go insane!_

Suddenly he had an idea! If she wouldn't let him run away maybe he could dup her somehow, maybe pretend to go along with this 'date' and she'll let her guard down. Thinking quickly he came up with a plan and took the lead from Amy Gaga by putting his arms around her and tipping her backwards. This made the green masked hedgehog ease her kissing a little so Sonic could gently break away. He had to keep this little charade up for his escape plan to work.

"You know, I know a little place where we can have some privacy" Not a very subtle move, but subtlety wasn't his aim, after all he wasn't trying to woo her just get away from her.

"Really?" she said letting her voice drop a few octaves and she gently pressed her forehead to his, Sonic noted that she had become much gentler now he had taken the lead. "Where?"

"Starlight Point" he said allowing his own voice to drop a little. "The place is pretty cool, and you can clearly see the stars in the sky and the glow of the moon."

Suddenly Amy leapt into his arms and put her hands around his neck "Then take me now!" she fluttered her eye lids. "Show me the stars." Sonic couldn't believe that after the way he'd been behaving up until now that she was actually buying this act, hook, line, sinker, rod, fisherman and trawler at once.

"You know what I'd love to do?" Sonic said trying to make his voice sound seductive, man he hadn't had a lot of practice with this but Amy Gaga seemed easily impressed. "I'd love to race you there."

"Race me?" Amy Gaga asked.

"Yeah, we both run, you're fast now, almost as fast as me." He tried to give her a cocky smile but when her hand gently stroked the back of his head he felt a cold shiver run down his spine.

"You think you're still faster than me? Wanna bet?" she said playfully.

"And the winner gets to pick where we go next." The blue hedgehog added this to sweeten the deal and Amy Gaga played right into his hands.

"DONE!" she said leaping out of his arms, the cuffs on their wrists broke and vanished like magic. She knelt down and pulled a starting pistol from inside her shirt. Pulling these objects from her blouse was clearly to get Sonics attention but all it did was make him roll his eyes at how desperate she was to get his affection. "Prepare to eat my dust."

"Hehe, we'll see!" Sonic said kneeling down next to her ready for a quick take off. He almost forgot he was trying to get away from her, not race her.

"Ready!" Amy lifted the starting pistol "Steady!" there came a bang from the pistol and both Sonic and Amy Gaga took off running. There was no doubt in his mind that Amy would over take him using the powers of the Mask, but instead Amy kept level with him as he ran faster and faster. His plan hinged on her going way faster than him, and she did, after giving him a quick peck on the lips she taunted "See you at the finish line!" and within the next second she blasted off and vanished into the distance and disappeared from sight.

_YES! _Sonic's screamed in victory in his head. He slowed down, changed direction and headed away from Amy Gaga. There was no chance Amy would win that race anyway for one specific reason, one that just made Sonic laugh. How far would she get before she realised Sonic had made the place up, Starlight Point didn't really exist!

He rushed as far as he could to find daylight, as long as he stayed on the light side of the planet Amy Gaga would never be able to reach her. He ran faster and faster and faster, skimming the top of lakes and zooming through cities in seconds.

He could travel as fast as the speed of sound but he very rarely did so because the sonic boom he creates damages things around him and there was a more fundamental problem to such speed, he couldn't react fast enough to incoming obstacles so he'd usually deliberately limit his own speed. But right now he was breaking that rule because he was doing something he never thought he'd do, he was running for the boarder.

He could see the shine of the sun on the horizon, he was home free. Then he spotted something and for a moment his heart froze thinking Amy Gaga had found him. She hadn't, it was something else. High in the sky was the round shape that could only be Dr. "Eggman" Robotnik's sky car. What's he up to? Sonic decided to find out.

* * *

Robotnik was out in force again flying through the sky in his Egg craft, he had three guard bots again escorting him in case he came across any green headed hedgehogs or blue ones for that matter. After his attack last night he wasn't going to take chances.

The scientist was heading for the last known locations of this creature who called himself Static, Robotnik decided he had to find out who this character was and stop him. Clearly he was also in possession of some kind of powerful magic, magic Dr. Robotnik wanted badly, with that magic plus the chaos emeralds he could rule the world! But first he had to find it and its source.

After two hours he arrived at a mountain where Static had left a hedgehog shaped hole running straight through it. It was the nearest landmark and the first he intended to investigate. His robots spent hours combing the area for any trace evidence, a lock of hair for example could give him a DNA match and maybe he could use his satellites to scan the whole planet to find the closest match to that DNA. There was only one flaw in his plan, he needed a DNA sample and so far he had none, he had nothing, Static didn't seem to leave anything when he passes through. That was until the scientist found something that no robot could see, something a machine would overlook. A footprint!

Robotnik knelt down and peered at it, at least he could find out the guys shoe size and type, by the look of it he had unusually feet. The scientist was going to do this forensically by taking plaster Paris, filling the print with it so he could get a perfect cast.

However before a drop could drip from his plaster of paris container a voice spooked him. "Hey, watcha doing, Eggman?"

Robotnik span his head to see someone he really didn't want to see, standing a few feet away was that irritating blue hedgehog Sonic. "Eggman? You haven't called me Eggman in months!" an awkward moment passed before Robotnik realised "Hey, wait a minute, why aren't my robots attacking?"

"What those things?" Sonic looked behind to see the robots checking the undergrowth. "I walked right past them, they seem focused on what they're doing."

"You stupid robots! Can't you focus on more than one task?" Robotnik fumed.

"Apparently not, what's this?" Sonic knelt down to look at the foot print.

"Never you mind you irritating rodent!" Robotnik growled waving his arms at him "Shoo! Leave me alone, I'm not even doing anything!"

"Okay I'll go then" Sonic said with a mischievous hint to his voice. Sonic rolled into a ball and began spinning around, faster and faster, kicking up dust as he did and then he fired away. Robotnik coughed in the dust cloud. He waved his hand in front of him to help clear the dust and when it had Robotnik growled in anger, because Sonics spinning had completely destroyed the footprint!

"AAHHHHH SONIC! NOW YOU'RE GONNA GET IT!" Robotnik got to his feet and yelled at his guard bots "AFTER HIM, NOW, GET HIM! DEAD OR ALIVE!" and the robots obeyed his command and raced after Sonic.

Completely forgetting why he was out there Robotnik leapt into his egg craft and took off in pursuit headache of a hedgehog.

* * *

Sonic expected Ro-butt-nik to send his robots after him. After a night with Amy Gaga he needed some excitement and this was just the stress relief he needed to blow off steam. Instead of attacking Sonic decided to play and test these robots ability to keep up with him, so far they were doing a decent job but they were just too slow. Sonic decided to let his foot off the gas pedal a bit and slow down so they could catch up, hey, he wanted to have a little fun with them, could you blame him?

Suddenly there as a blast as something fired at Sonic missing him by a hair. The robots must have advanced weapons as they began firing at him with bright, yellow balls of some kind of electricity, and all the time they kept missing him by a hair but each time their shots were getting more and more accurate, probably down to their computer re-calibrating and re-aiming at their target he guessed. Some of Tails' electronic technobable was really starting to rub off on him.

Sonic had to take a turn and in an instant turned 90 degrees and headed off in another direction followed by the robots. Hey, these toys were impressive, better then that old, rusted Metal Sonic. Again Sonic turned and started heading towards something tall in the distance. He emerged into desert and could see the tall tower like thing was a stack, a tall, steep lump of rock forged by centuries of strong wind eroding it or something like that, Sonic ran up to it and started to run along it, the robots followed and for the next few minutes both Sonic and the robots ran around and around this large stack like they were dancing around it. For some reason Sonic had some kind of classic waltz music in his head, if it was actually playing it would've made this scene look funnier to him.

After a couple of minutes of this Sonic shot forward and caught up with the robots and before they knew what had happened Sonic had smashed into both of them so hard they fell apart there and then. Sonic landed on the ground in a shower of robot parts. It seems those new robots have a weakness at the back that Sonic did not know about. Unfortunately for the hedgehog, so did he because he felt strong arms grab him and lift him up. Amy's got him! He feared, but when the person span him around it wasn't Amy who'd got him but another Guard Bot, there must've been a third that wasn't as stupid as the others.

The evil, hysterical cackle of Dr. E signalled his arrival. His hover craft settled down in front of Sonic and Dr. Robotnik grinned and Sonic just glared at him. "You fell for one of the oldest tricks in the book!" Robotnik gloated.

"You should know, you've fallen for most of them" Sonic shot back.

Robotnik gripped his vehicles control stick so hard it looked like it was threatening to break. "Laugh all you want blue boy, but I've got the prefect punishment for you."

Robotnik's sky car took him high into the air and the robot that had Sonic followed him. Sonic struggled with all his strength but this robot just held him too tightly. If he could only curl up into a ball he could perform his speed dash but the robots arms prevented this. Sonic didn't know how long they flew, a couple of minutes? But when they arrived at the destination Sonic knew he was in trouble. Robotnik had carried him to a large lake and at first Sonic thought he was just going to let the robot drop him in. But instead Robotnik made for a tiny piece of mud that poked above the surface. Robotnik ordered the robot to drop the hedgehog and it did and he came to stand ankle deep in soft, waterlogged mud.

"You think this will stop me? I'll just run across the water or under it!" Sonic grinned, a grin that slowly started to melt when he realised he couldn't move his feet, he was stuck! Then the grin on Robotnik's face began to unnerved Sonic.

"HA! You're hopelessly trapped! Remember I'm a scientist Sonic, I've studied you, on this tiny spit of land you don't have the distance to get enough speed up to skim the surface tension of the water, and going under would be a bad idea, the under currents are strong in this lake, you'll never make it to the other side!"

"Wanna bet?" Sonic challenged Robotnik trying not to let on that he was stuck here anyway.

"You can try if you like and find out the truth the hard way, or you can stay here until the tide rises sufficiently to drowned you in 2 hours, either way you're dead." Robotnik cackled.

"What makes you think the tide will rise enough to do that in just 2 hours?"

Robotnik held up his right hand "because of this!" and snapped his fingers. The robot he had somehow knew what to do, it raced over towards the distance where a solid, concrete wall was. A dam, a hydroelectric dam! The robot disappeared under the water with a slash.

"The Alpha unit, that robot, is going to clog that dams drainage pipes with silt and mud, the water running into this lake from the surrounding mountains and from upstream will cause the water to rise, it's recently rained in the valleys beyond so I estimate in about two hours the water level will reach your head then its goodnight Sonic!" Robotnik explained. "The people working there could probably clear the blockage, but can they do it in time?"

"After all we've been through you're just going to leave me here?" Sonic protested as Robotniks hovercraft turned to face away from him, without turning to view the hedgehog the scientist said "Why not? Even if this doesn't kill you it'll keep you out of my hair for a few days!" Then Robotniks car began to rise into the air, his machine pet shot up out of the water to join him and they began to fly away into the distance.

Though Sonic was as cool as a cucumber he understood he was in trouble. The average person would probably call for help on a cell phone, but Sonic didn't possess a cell phone, he couldn't think of anything more irritating then being able to be contacted 24, 7, especially if Amy got a hold of his number. Maybe Amy could help him with the Masks powers? But Sonic wasn't that desperate, yet.

He felt the water seeping into shoes and started to soak his feet. Maybe another opportunity would arise, maybe the tide wouldn't rise as high, maybe the clog in the dam would unclog itself, but those were unlikely. All Sonic knew was that he was running out of time and for once he didn't know what to do.

* * *

**To Be Continued...**

* * *

**Authors notes: **This was originally due to be released around February or April of last year or February this year to be a weird kind of Valentine story, but I missed the deadline and re-wrote it a little, then I stopped writing for a long while, Valentines day came around again and I missed that date again. You can probably tell I re-wrote this around the time of Titanic 3D being released in the cinemas. I wasn't waiting for Valentines day specifically, I just stopped writing for abit to focus on other projects.

My opinion of the film Titanic... well it could've been a better film in my mind if they cut out the romance rubbish, personally I'd always go with 'A Night to Remember' as a better telling of the tragedy.

I wanted to develop Amy Gaga (Amy's Mask) further by turning her into the most repulsive, creepy, clingy girl you could imagine, (this in no way reflects my taste in women, lol) but is what I think Amy would actually be like minus her inhibitions. She's just a ball of passion, lust, anger and aggression, driven by her overwhelming emotions and clings to Sonic more like a possession then a person as the base desires of the ID means she wouldn't be romantic, and without the Ego or Super Ego Amy Gaga would have no conception of what true love actually is. In other words she clings to Sonic because she's really interested in only one thing from him, and no, I won't go into details about what that is, you can probably make a guess for yourself.

Hope you all enjoyed the update, more to come soon.

Cheers

-TimeLordParadox


	12. The Flood

**Act 4**

**Chapter 11**

**The Flood**

Knuckles had spent hours searching high and low for any clue to where this Mask of Loki could possibly be and he was getting nowhere and starting to get tired. No one and he meant no one knew what this Mask of Loki even was, but he did get some background info on this Loki character from an expert in archaeology who happened to be close to the mystic ruins investigating them.

Loki was some sort of Viking god who's speciality was making mischief and causing chaos for other gods and other supernatural beings. The more he'd learnt about Loki the more he sounded like that Green Hedgehog. He'd also learnt that Loki's main power was the ability to shape shift and transform his entire physical appearance at will to fool other people. What didn't make sense though was that Loki was supposed to have a human like form and yet Loki appeared to prefer looking like a hedgehog no matter what guise he took. Knuckles was no genius but that didn't make sense to him unless Loki wore forms like a person wears clothes depending on how they feel.

But now he was relying on his treasure hunting instincts again and they told him to head east, some called his instinct just luck but how lucky can you get when you unearth Chaos Emeralds and treasures like he can? However this time his instinct seemed to have come up empty because all it did was lead him to a lake.

"Hey, Knuckles!" someone shouted at him. He looked around, left and right and all around but he couldn't see who was shouting. "Hey, over here!" came the voice again. It sounded like it was coming from the other side of the lake. But that would've been too far for noise to travel. That's when he saw a microscopic speck standing on the surface of the water. It was Sonic.

"Sonic? What are you doing out there?" the Echidna shouted back.

"What does it look like? I'm waiting for the tide to come up! Can you help?" Sonic was asking Knuckles for help? This was new, and oh man Knuckles knew he was gonna get a lot of mileage out of this one. Obviously Sonic wasn't standing on the water, probably on a spit of land. The water was currently up to his waist and the hedgehog looked like he was shivering from the cold. He would probably die of hyperthermia before drowning.

"No problem" Knuckles said smugly and starting to wade into the water smirking as he did "Don't worry Sonic, I'm on my wa..." he never got to finish that sentence when after a misplaced step Knuckles suddenly slid straight down and was submerged into the water having stepped over a sunken ledge. When he emerged on the surface coughing he heard Sonic call to him "Be careful, it's deep."

"Thanks" Knuckles shouted in sarcasm climbing out of the lake, he knew Sonic would be laughing his backside off on the inside and the Echidna considered just leaving him there for a little longer. But when he turned back to face Sonic he realised the hedgehog wasn't even looking at him anymore. Instead he was looking a little to his left and slowly his face became one of horror. In the next moment a streak of green zoomed across the lake and swiped Sonic from the tiny island and came to stop at the other side of the lake, too distant for Knuckles to see. Maybe it was that Green Hedgehog! Knuckles realised and broke into a run so he could investigate.

Maybe his treasure hunting senses weren't so off after all.

* * *

Knuckles wasn't the first person Sonic would've asked for help, but he would've gotten down and begged for Knuckles help rather than receive the charity of the one who did save him. Even from a long way away Sonic could see Amy Gaga zooming towards him, arms outstretched ready to embrace him, and she swept him up off the island and to the other side of the lake and held onto him tightly again.

"Oh, you tease you, there was no such place as Starlight point" she squealed, at least she wasn't angry or trying to smash his head open with a hammer as Amy usually would at such a trick. Sonic then noticed that unlike before when she hugged him his arms were free, free to snake around the back of her head and pull the Mask off her but she refused to stay still, she was always moving energetically and playfully like this was a game to her and each time he failed to grab the rubber Mask she'd peck him mockingly on the cheek.

"Sonic! Sonic! You okay! Who's with you?" that was Knuckles, he was coming!

"Amy!" Sonic said in a hushed voice "Knuckles is coming."

"Oh, feel a little bit of rivalry?" she smirked at him "Are you going to fight him for the pretty girl?"

_I've fought over prettier things from the garbage disposal when I was eight. _Sonic thought. He could hear Knuckles getting closer, for some reason he somehow knew that Knuckles mustn't get his hands on the Mask, he couldn't figure out why thought. While he was wearing it the Mask was always trying to force him to stay away from Knuckles Master Emerald, like the wooden curse had a mind of its own, he didn't know what would happen, only that it would be bad, and if Knuckles saw Amy with a green head surely he'd put two and two together... okay, maybe not today, maybe not tomorrow but he'll figure it out eventually.

"No Amy, you've got to take the Mask off" Sonic said sternly to make her take him seriously for a change "Knuckles can't know you're wearing the Mask!"

Amy Gaga sighed and rolled her eyes "Aww, you're no fun" she said in a huff and reached behind her head and pulled on the Mask causing the rubber thing to stretch, but she didn't remove it, when it snapped back into place it had turned back to her usual pink fur and peach face and her dress had morphed back to its original red one. "Better?" she said her voice back to normal. She looked perfectly like Amy without the Mask but that was only until she smiled and those freakishly large, white teeth appeared shining like bathroom tiles, and she still had those wide, crazy eyes, staring eyes. Oh wait, Amy really did have those. Despite the imperfections it would have to do since she refused to remove that cursed thing and Knuckles had just come from around some boulders.

"Sonic?" he asked "Amy?" he asked in surprise.

"Yes?" Amy asked, even when she was trying to act like herself she still looked creepy.

"Are you okay?" Knuckles asked her, "You look a little funny."

Within seconds Amy was right up close to him so their eyes were only inches apart "Me? Funny? Funny when, funny how?" she said aggressively then leaned forward causing Knuckles to bend over backwards. "You find me ammmmuuuuusing?"

Sonic immediately reached forward and pulled Amy away from him and Sonic smiled a little worriedly "She's hit herself on the head. She was trying to hit someone and..." suddenly Amy somehow got her arms wrapped around him again, "I'd say I've already hit on you!" she screeched. This was just starting to get irritating and Sonic pushed Amy off him and this time she offered no resistance.

"Right?" Knuckles said clearly not interested in this exchange between them, "What was that green streak that saved you?"

Sonic had to think fast and an explanation came into his head quickly. "It was just one of Tails' machines." He said quickly and coolly after regaining his composure.

"Really?" Knuckles said unconvinced. Sonic had to fight to maintain eye contact with Knuckles because Amy was being a total nuisance behind the Echidna. First she raised two fingers behind his head to give him rabbit ears, then she produced a wooden sign on a stick from behind her back which had a giant rooster on it and an arrow pointing towards Knuckles, Sonic understood the rooster was a cock and that's what she was silently calling Knuckles. When Knuckles turned to see what Sonic was looking at Amy quickly hid the sign behind her back and began whistling innocently like a cartoon character from a Tom and Jerry cartoon.

Knuckles turned back to Sonic to continue their exchange. "Where is Tails then? I've never known him to run off like this."

"Well..." Sonic said nervously scratching the back of his right ear, but before he could say another word Amy pulled out another sign which had a giant spanner on it and an arrow pointing to Knuckles, in other words calling Knuckles a 'Tool', again Knuckles looked back and Amy hid the sign behind her back again, to quickly get his attention back Sonic continued, he shrugged and said "...Tails had to take it back to the workshop, he has trouble stopping the thing."

"Right" Knuckles said unsure whether to believe him "It wasn't that Green Hedgehog was it? The one I'm looking for, Loki?"

He still thought Sonics alter ego Static was actually Loki himself? How dumb was he? Similar thoughts were going through Amy Gaga's mind because the next sign she pulled out had a picture of a screw and a baseball on it.

"Nah, I haven't seen him" Sonic shrugged maintaining his cool despite the bizarreness happening behind the red Echidna.

Clearly Knuckles wasn't buying it as the sudden shift in his mood suggested, he let his knees bend and his fists clenched. "You're hiding something from me Hedgehog." He only called him Hedgehog when we was really ticked off at him. Knuckles looked set to try to beat the info out of him, a fight that in Sonics mind Knuckles would never win unless you're in some imaginary universe, but more worryingly for Sonic was that Amy seemed set on protecting him from Knuckles.

She had hid the last sign behind her back and instead produced a massive hammer the size of a house, she swung it behind her back with little effort and intended to swing it down on top of Knuckles! There was no doubt in Sonic's mind that if that landed on top of the smaller Echidna then Knuckles would be crushed ad killed, but surely Amy wouldn't! She wouldn't... would she? Amy Gaga began to swing the hammer down as Knuckles started advancing.

"STOP!" Sonic shouted and both Knuckles and Amy stopped their attack, Knuckles still blissfully ignorant that he was close to death with the hammer literally only inches from his head. "Seriously Knuckles I don't know where or who this Loki guy is, but I'll keep any eye out for you, buddy."

Knuckles relaxed and stood back up straight again. "Okay" he said, to Sonic's amazement he was actually backing down. "But I think you'll want to find this Loki character to. He's crazy, dangerous and I've heard he's much faster than you."

"Yeah, I can believe that..." Sonic said giving Amy Gaga a warning glance to put that stupid hammer away before someone gets hurt. She shrugged giving him a 'you're no fun' look and the hammer vanished with a puff of smoke. Knuckles turned back to Amy who was still standing innocently as if nothing had happened.

Suddenly Sonic realised that what he had just said wasn't the response he'd usually give Knuckles if he hadn't been worried about Amy trying to kill the Echidna with his back turned.

"...I mean, faster than me? You think so? Find him for me and I'll take him on, no problem." The hedgehog said the confidence coming back into his voice. This made Knuckles less suspicious of him Sonic guessed, because he grunted held up his hand as if to dismiss them, turned and walked away.

Sonic released a breath he didn't know he was holding, which was followed by even more breath when Amy suddenly started crushing his chest again in a tight hug. "Now that the old, scared, rat is gone maybe we can have some alone time."

Oh, great! He was back to square one! Maybe he was a bit hasty in trying to get rid of Knuckles.

"Oh Sonic, you make my world shake!" Amy Gaga said. But wait a second! The world was shaking!

Sonic looked at the dam Robotnik's robot had clogged to get the water in the lake to rise. A whole section of a hill in the distance had broken away and was sliding into the water, a landslide probably caused by the water logging of the ground -something he'd learnt from the Discovery Channel- a similar thing happened in someplace or other in the world and the landslide cause a mini tidal wave that went over the edge of the dam and destroyed towns and villages beyond and killed hundreds of people, and it looks like that's what's going to happen here!

As the landslide ended a large hump of water reared up in the lake and it began to race across towards the dam, it gained height and became a wall of water as it crashed into the dam and went over the side. Sonic looked over at the distance and saw many lights in the darkness of towns and villages built near to the dam. They were in danger! Sonic had to help them but he didn't know how, even he couldn't stop a raging torrent of water.

His thoughts were dragged back to the situation he was in as Amy Gaga squeezed more air from his lungs again. Wait, the Mask! Maybe he could use its powers! If he was quick maybe he could stop the torrent, save the towns and remove the Mask before it takes control of him.

"Amy!" Sonic struggled in her grip "I need the Mask, now!"

"No deal!" Amy Gaga said cutting Sonic off "If I take the Mask off you'll just run away again. I'm not giving this up if it means you're mine!"

_Oh, for the love of...! _"Amy, I need it to save those people!"

"Are they on this date?!" Amy exclaimed, she reared up and looked around her head swivelling 360 before turning back to him "I don't see anyone else here. It's just us, on this date, by ourselves, on our own..." she tightened her grip and pulled Sonic closer towards her "...alone."

Amy Gaga wasn't Amy Rose in the same way Tailspin wasn't Tails, Sonic didn't blame Amy, it's just how the Mask gets into your head but right now he had to get her off him and get the Mask off her. Maybe if he could fool her once he could do it again.

"You know, if we do go to a restaurant they've got a strict 'no Masks' rule" Sonic said taking the lead off her again wrapping his own arms around her and make it so he was holding her, not the other way around.

"Nice try!" Amy Gaga said trying to take the lead from him again, but Sonic tried to remain in control.

"Have you ever been to a fancy restaurant where someone's wearing a Mask?" Sonic asked hoping this will get the point across.

"With the amount of makeup some girls wear, technically yes." Amy Gaga mocked, she was playing with him.

Sonic heard the water crashing and roaring down the valley, oh come on. What was it going to take to get the Mask off her? If he could just get his fingers into that fold at the back of the head he could rip it off!

Sonic had one last idea to try, he took the lead from her again leaned over her, he may not be too good at manipulating people, usually, but Amy was always gullible and had clearly always wanted him to do this. "Give me a kiss, Amy" and again dunce Amy Gaga fell for it, this time hook, line, sinker, rod, fisherman, trawler, dock and the fishing village.

Sonic felt his lips meet the rubbery counterparts and Amy Gaga relaxed as she embraced him and he pretended to embrace her. The hedgehog felt a little creeped out when he felt Amy's tongue push through into his mouth and he nearly broke away in disgust, not because of the kiss, but because Amy Gaga's tongue felt so long it was close to going down his throat! What was wrong with her?! He had to constantly remind himself _I've got to save people, I've got to save people_ to keep this up_._ Anyway once he'd gotten the Mask off her this would be over so he bit his tongue figuratively speaking and continued with this charade.

Then Sonic made his move, his hands flung up and he grabbed the fold of the Mask and he pulled on it with all his might. With Amy Gaga's loud screams of protest it started to come away from her head. Sonic was blinded by the green light and Amy Gaga gripped Sonic's ears trying to force him to let go of the Mask but he wasn't going to give up. He put his foot on Amy Gaga's chest and pushed with all his strength and the Mask popped off Amy's face with a snapping hiss of crackling fireworks.

Sonic took a step back and fell over into the dirt. After regaining his composure he found the Mask was already attached to his face, but the other way around and by the lips. The wooden thing had hardened around his mouth and his lips were trapped in its mouth, but with one good pull the wooden curse gave him his lips back.

Amy was sitting on the floor looking around as if she was confused. "Sonic? Where am I? What happened?"

Sonic quickly got to his feet and looked at the valley beyond, he could still see the raging water flowing towards the towns, it still hadn't reached them so he still had time. "Sorry Amy..." Sonic said hurriedly turning the Mask over and peering into its dark back, for a second he was willing himself and his inner self to maintain control and stop the water. "...talk later!" and without hesitation he rammed the Mask onto his own face. He felt the unnatural warmth of the thing, the numb feeling and the crushing pressure as the Mask surrounded his head, broke down the barriers of his mind and began filling his body with the reality warping power. Then came the familiar twist that sent him into a twisting tornado and he emerged two seconds later as Static.

"Wheeeee!" he said as he came to a stop "How am I looking today?"

Sonic, now Static produced from nowhere a full length dress mirror and checked himself out, he looked exactly the same as before. His body was still blue, his face and head hair and quills were spiked up a little, his eyes were scarlet and his teeth massive. The only difference in his appearance this time was that he'd ditched his last costume and settled for just a pair of yellow shoes with a red strap and dark coloured gloves. "I'm looking goooood!" he winked at himself.

He then turned to Amy and a cocky grin spread over his face at the sight of the cute girl Hedgehog. He rushed over to her and put his arm around her. "Well hello there. You know you've got a big hammer, wanna see my screwdriver?"

"Soni... wait want did you just say?" Amy asked outraged, she stared at him accusingly.

"My screwdriver, here" and playfully Static produced just that, a screwdriver, a blue one with an image of Sonic himself craved into the handle. "My little Sonic, I call it a Sonic Screwdriver!" he then looked away from Amy and said "And yes, that was a DW reference!" Static said winking at someone other than Amy who wasn't there.

Amy looked around clueless "Who are you talking to?"

All the while Static was feeling the tug on his mind as that one part of him that was still technically Sonic rang out informing him to focus and save the village. Signing Static shrugged and removed his arm from Amy but then took her by the shoulders and said. "Hey, hang around" he said placing his fore and mid fingers on her chin to gently make her look at him "we've still got a date to finish!" he winked and in the blink of an eye he'd vanished.

Static leapt over the dam, caught up with raging torrent and rode it like a wave using a surf board he'd produced magically. Surfing over the torrent of water he skimmed the edges of it and he took this moment to show off because he probably knew some girls somewhere would be watching him.

He spread his arms and left leg out so he surfed on only one foot, then he dropped into a hand stand but balancing himself on only one hand, then he went the whole hog and surfed on his head. He grinned proudly at himself and closed his eyes while he did to look even smugger, this was a mistake as he slammed into something taking him off his bored. Without looking where he was going he'd just smashed into a tree.

_Oh man, no girls had better been watching, this was bad enough._ Static thought before deciding to get back to work. In the wink of an eye he was at the head of the torrent of water, he stopped and for some strange reason he pulled out of the folds of reality a set of traffic lights and set them up in the ground. For some reason he thought this would logically work. The light turned red and Static held up his hand and said "HALT!" The tidal wave apparently didn't speak English as it ran the red light and rolled over him.

_Well, I'm all out of ideas_ Static thought to himself sitting down on the wet ground that was still being torn up and churned by the advancing water. Despite all this chaos going on around him Static sat there as cool as a cucumber.

His thoughts soon went back onto the subject of girls as his raging hormones took over the job of driving the Mask from his brain. Amy wasn't Static's type personally but he wasn't exactly picky, the one girl he really felt an attraction for was Blaze, a cat but she was from another dimension and rarely called, another girl he fancied was one he knew long ago called Sally, and there was Rogue the Bat, she was older then he was but boy she had a great pair of...

_Will you stop thinking with your groin!_ A thought came to his mind like a bolt of lighting as part of Sonic screamed at him from the realms of his subconscious. Apparently willing himself to do something before putting the Mask on was having the right effect, it was a feeble effort but it was reminding Static that people were in danger, which irritated Static a lot.

"Okay, fine jeez!" Static said out loud despite his lungs being full of water. Okay he had a ranging torrent of water, a town full of people to save and a cute, pink hedgehog on the hills watching his every move. Wouldn't the towns themselves stop the water eventually if there were enough of them for the water to crash through? The answer was yes, but something told him it was a bad plan. Better still why not cut out the middle man and just go back up there to Amy and... and... and... why was it so difficult to concentrate?

Man his brain felt like jelly, thoughts were trying to bubble in one way, while others were trying to drag it another, and while Sonic and Static were fighting each other like this they were losing time planning on how to stop the water! Water! Jelly! That's it!

It was another stupid plan but for some reason Static thought it would work which in his mind automatically meant it would work but at the same time it didn't inspire much confidence considering his plan to stop the water with a traffic light failed miserably. But Static felt happy this time as he rushed out of the raging water. It was just about to plough into the first town until Static produced jelly mix from nowhere and dumped the mix into the water.

It was painfully slow to watch but the water instantly slowed as if someone was gradually slowing down a film. Static watched lazily as the forming jelly reached the sign welcoming people into the town and then it froze, the entire raging torrent had become a massive blob of jelly.

_That actually worked?! _Said a thought in Static's mind "Of course it worked, why wouldn't it?"

As Static viewed the wall of jelly he turned back to the village. There was no sign of panic or any attempt to get away as everyone was still in bed, had Static not managed to stop the water the people would've been taken completely unawares.

This made the Sonic part of Static feel good, but the Static part of Static just felt indifferent. He turned to the wall of Jelly again and thought mischievously "It's missing something."

Then Static understood what was wrong and after zooming off at the speed of light he appeared in the Arctic circle thousands of miles away, and using a spoon the size of a lake he dug it into the slow moving glacier then jumped on the handle of it. It launched what amounted to a massive iceberg high into the night sky. Static quickly appeared at the head of this ball of ice on a narrowing peak. He spread out his arms at his sides and mockingly screaming "I'm the King of the Wooooooooorld!" mere seconds before the iceberg smashed into the jelly, mixing both together in one harmonious whole that was ice cream and jelly.

Static felt very proud of his creation, a work of art. However Static failed to notice that with this one extra addition he'd also snowed the town in, destroyed buildings and damaged public property. But in Static's mind he'd just saved them so they should be thanking him and he should be allowed to break as many buildings as he liked!

Smiling at his handy work and with his mission complete Static suddenly realised something. The part of his mind that was Sonic had stopped pulling on his own brain. Sonic was safely tucked away somewhere where he wouldn't cause Static any more trouble. Static smiled, it was time for some fun!

* * *

Many miles away Dr. Robotnik grinned evilly at his accomplishment. Leaving Sonic in that humiliating position would be a big blow to his ego and Robotnik found that immensely more satisfying then just killing him, once Sonic is dead he's dead, he feels nothing. Humiliate him and that lasts a lifetime.

But then his little trap might kill the rodent but why should he care? Robotnik had preformed cruel and fatal procedures on rats before why break that habit?

There was a nagging sensation at the back of the scientists mind though. A voice that told him he should've ended Sonic while he had the chance, all it would've taken was one blow to the head, enough to shatter his skull and Sonic would be stone cold dead and out of his hair forever. At the same time however Robotnik for some reason felt a strange sense of regret and he didn't know why. If Sonic died there was nothing to stop him taking over the world but there was a part of him that didn't want that to happen.

Robotnik felt his long moustache droop. He enjoyed the challenge, the opposition to his plans because he had to figure out a way to overcome it. Everyone else who ever went up against him was either too stupid or too weak to overcome his power which would make conquering the world too easy. Robotnik was no psychologist but he felt he was on the edge of an epiphany, or he was until he felt something hit the underside of his hover craft.

"HUH?" Robotnik yelped in panic and leaned over the side to get a look at what he'd just hit, or what had hit him, but there was nothing, nothing was attached to the hull of his craft and nothing was falling to the ground. For a second Robotnik feared something might have worn out and broke loose on his craft. Putting it out of his mind he leaned back in his seat, and yelped in surprise at the figure sitting on the hood of his hover craft.

"Hi!" said the Green Hedgehog called Static.

"You!" Robotnik said as he tried to sink further into his chair and pointed an accusing figure at the green headed hedgehog. "It's you!"

"Is it?" the hedgehog asked and began feeling his own arms, legs and head "What do you know, it is me!"

"What are you trying to do! Give me a heart attack?" Robotnik panted clutching his chest.

"You gotta have a heart before you can have an attack" the hedgehog said wiggling his large teeth.

"I know who you are!" Robotnik said trying to put more of a superior tone into his voice "I worked it out. You're Loki, God of Mischief!" The hedgehogs face dropped.

"Our survey says!" the hedgehog said adopting the voice of a British TV presenter. A large, yellow X appeared in the sky in front of Robotnik's craft that was made up of a lot of smaller yellow dots, there also came the sound of an EEEEE-ERRRRR which would signify a wrong answer in a game show.

Static then leapt to his feet, leaned over the open glass windscreen and knocked hard three times on Robotnik's balled head. It didn't hurt, weirdly, but it made the noise of a large empty, metal tank. The saying 'empty vessels make the most noise' came into Robotnik's head and he felt his teeth grit automatically, this spiky rodent was calling him dumb!

"Is anyone in there?! I'm called Static!" Static said rapping his knuckles on Robotnik's head, this time he felt it. "For a guy with an IQ of 300 you're acting very dense!"

"Dense!" Robotnik's temper rose, he couldn't stand being called dumb being a doctor after all. "I'm a doctor with an IQ of 300, I went to university and studied hard to become the evil genius I am today. What education have you got?"

"Education doesn't equal intelligence." Static grinned, he was clearly about to make a joke. "Politian's and Lawyers are gods proof of that."

"Grrr!" Robotik wanted to reach out and strangle the hedgehog, but that evil smile crossed his lips again. He adopted a more civilised tone "Listen Static, maybe we got off on the wrong foot, let's put all past... mistakes and misunderstandings behind us." Robotnik intended to manipulate Static into doing his bidding, it had worked with Knuckles countless times so it should work with Static. "I have something for you."

"Really?" Static said suddenly interested. "Is it a Sega game?!"

"Yea... umm... no!" Robotnik said

"A new Monkey Island game?" asked leaning in closer to Robotnik each suggestion more stupid then the last.

"NO!"

"A review of a Sega game that's not written by a Nintendo loyalist?"

"NO!... A what? NO!"

"A set of polished, silver, Edwardian cutlery?"

"NO!"

"Purple drapes?"

"NO!" Robotnik was starting to get irritated by this rodent turning everything into a childish game.

"A picture of Rogue the bat topless?"

"Will you be serious for one sec..." Robotik paused realising what Static had just asked "Ugh! You're sick! Where would I even get something like that?"

"Try DeviantART! So what have you got for me then?"

"It's..." Robotnik began regain his composure.

"It's going to be socks and aftershave isn't it?"

"WILL YOU SHUT UP FOR FIVE SECONDS AND I'll TELL YOU!" Robotnik fumed. Static just smiled "Sure thing, pal"

"Okay, I propose..."

"We shoot Justin Bieber before he breeds!" Static suggested

"What did I just say?" Robotnik fumed.

"I kept quiet for five seconds! What's your problem?" Static grinned.

Robotnik went silent and waited for any other loony things Static was going to say. None came. "Finished?" Robotnik asked and he began. "There are these mysterious gems called Chaos Emerald and..." Robotnik suddenly gagged when Static forced a large, white smelly sock into his mouth.

"Put a sock in it, I know what you're going to offer me cue ball and I ain't interested!" Static got up and stretched, his neck clicked as he twisted his head left and right.

"If you do not side with me then you're my enemy and this means war!" Robotnik fumed in warning after spitting that sock out of his mouth. "And you will have to fight an army of my best robots!"

"Whatever diaper breath" Static sighed but didn't realise that Robotnik's one remaining guard bot, the surviving one that Sonic didn't destroy a few minutes ago, was sneaking up behind him about to zap him "Me against an army of robots, it just doesn't seem fair does it? Maybe I'll fight left handed."

Static raised his left hand and it suddenly burst into a torch of electrical arcs, without turning Static tucked his left arm under his right and pointed his fingers backwards. Jets of electrical energy discharged from the tips of his fingers and enveloped the guard bot. It began to shake and slowly it blasted itself apart, it burst into flames with a loud bang the ruined robot started falling to earth.

"POP QUIZ! Do you know why I called myself Static?" he asked as he stopped his lighting show "Come on you're an egghead!"

Robotnik didn't answer, he just sank deeper into his chair wishing it would absorb him so he could get away from this mad creature.

"I'll show you!" Static suddenly zoomed off into the distance in a flash, barely a second had passed and Robotnik felt something slam into the back of his craft, arc above him and land back on his ships nose. "Apart from the usual powers of super speed, strength, intelligence, invulnerability etc, I can run at the speed of light, and I found out when I do that my fur builds a large Static charge."

Static held up his right hand this time, electrical energy arced over it and his fur began to stand on end as he appeared to concentrate all the charge into his right hand. Basically Static was saying he was a massive electrical capacitor, able to hold and discharge electrical power. Robotnik stared in wonderment at how much electrical energy must be stored in Static at this moment to cause his robots to break apart like that, and his brain began to think up of countless uses, but then fear crept back into him when he realised Static was about to use the power of his namesake.

"A static charge I can control and dissipate in a big burst like so!" and Static plunged his hand onto the hood of Robotik's craft. Barely a second had past when all the instruments on the vehicles dash exploded out in puffs of smoke and the entire craft became a giant faraday cage. Which thankfully conducted most of the charge away and around him, but Robotik himself got a very unpleasant shock that lasted ten seconds.

Once it had passed Robotnik breathed in and out, he'd never experienced such raw pain before in his life. Even after all the times his vehicle has crashed or been knocked out of the sky, it just didn't compare how bad Static's attack was. It was so bad that Robotnik's glasses had become clouded and his moustache was sticking up and out like he had two Chinese fans attached to his face. He also had the sensation of falling...

Wait... falling? He was falling! His craft had been destroyed and he was fast accelerating down to the ground at breakneck speed.

"WOW!" Static said looking over the side "What a view of the mountains!" he said this as if he was in no danger himself. "Funnily enough the closer we get the more it looks like we're going to die!"

"WE ARE GOING TO DIE!" Robotnik screamed

"Speak for yourself!" Static added coolly.

"DO SOMETHING" Robotnik urged him.

Static wasted precious seconds regarding him with curiosity before doing something, he produced a pack of pens in his hand, he reached in and took one out. He stood still and flipped the pen up trying to get it to roll up, around his ear and stay there, but he missed so he reached into the pack of pens, got another one and tried the same trick again, he missed so he went for another one.

"DO SOMETHING USEFUL!" Robotnik urged as the ground fast approached "SAVE MEEEE!"

Static tossed the pack of pens behind his back "Well why didn't you say so?" and in the next second Static was gone, vanished.

"Where are you going, you can't abandon meEEEEE!" Robotnik was saying until he felt a shocking and painful tug at his underwear. He was lifted clean out of his craft which continued to fall to the ground and seconds later smashed into a million pieces. Robotnik was safe, but what on earth had saved him?

Robotnik looked at his backside and saw his underwear was stretched out into a massive wedgie, the underpants rose up above him and it looked like they had been caught on a tree branch. But there was no tree attached to that branch. Standing on the side of the mountain his craft had smashed against Static held the branch like he was going fishing. In fact that's what the branch was, a fishing rod! Where the heck had he got that?

"Couldn't you have saved me some other way?" Robotnik fumed his face going red with rage.

"Yes" Static admitted "But this way was more fun to watch!" Robotnik then noticed Static was holding a camera phone and was pointing the lenses at Robotnik and the red light said it was recording. "This is 'so' going on Facebook!" he giggled and appeared to be uploading it as Robotnik watched.

"Okay, where can I drop you off?" Static then asked. Robotnik looked down realising how inappropriate the phrase was.

"Just put me down, slowly!" Robotnik shouted.

"You're the boss" Robotnik wished he hadn't said it like that because Static released the reel on his fishing rod and Robotik began to plummet the few hundred feet or so to the ground, he screamed and squealed but before impact he came to an undignified stop, his underpants couldn't take this straight anymore and they snapped. "Whoops, wasn't as slow as I could've been" Static chuckled.

Robotnik fell only the last 2 feet to the ground among the wreckage of his hover craft and he breathed heavily just to be glad to be back on the ground. He looked back up at Static and shot him an acid look, but Static didn't pay any attention, all he did was fiddle with his cell phone again and giggle loudly.

"Another one for Facebook!" he said with a small pop he was gone and with a loud crack he was standing over Robotnik.

"I even got a cool picture of you flailing in midair." The hedgehog showed him the picture, Robotnik was falling through midair flailing his arms, screaming at the top of his lungs. "You scream like a girl!" Static giggled "I just need to brown up your mighty white-ies on this picture and I've got a new desktop wallpaper!" Static grinned manically but Robotnik was too glad to be alive to worry about how badly his reputation as a bad guy would be damaged once those photos got out, but slowly it started to dawn on him how angry he was on the inside and how much he wanted to grab Static and ring his little neck. But as he sat up to grab him, Static vanished with a loud crack and this time he didn't come back.

Robotnik fell back in the dirt with only his mounting rage to keep him company. In Robotniks mind Static had officially replaced Sonic has the most irritating rat he'd ever met in his entire life.

* * *

Sonic and Amy were really acting strangely, Knuckles admitted but maybe Sonic didn't know anything about Loki after all. It must just be because they both look alike that Knuckles assumed Sonic knew him.

"Well, well" said a familiar, confident ghostly voice "If it isn't my pal who never chuckles, the Echidna Knuckles!"

Knuckles spun around to find the Green Hedgehog, Loki standing right behind him. "What are you doing?" he asked.

"Looking for you!" Knuckles snarled "I want that Mask of yours!"

"And I want Sega to pull their heads out of their backsides and make a more deceit game for me, but we know it ain't gonna happen." He said wiggling his teeth, what the heck was he talking about? "Stop these stupid games and give me the Mask!"

"First answer me one question!" Loki said and when Knuckles didn't reply he asked anyway "Echidna are one of the few mammals that lay eggs, right?" suddenly Loki zoomed over to him, stepped behind him and pulled on Knuckles tail forcing him to bend over. "So where does the egg come from?" he asked. "Have you got an Eggs-pliation" Knuckles continued to struggle and waved his arms to swat the hedgehog away from him but he couldn't reach "Learning about Zoology is very Egg-citing." They were bad puns but Knuckles knew they were supposed to irritate him and they were working.

"GET OFF ME!" Knuckles shouted trying to swat this menace away from him.

"Knuckles, you 'crack' me up! Oooh, actually I can see why you're always so tense. It's compensating for something, four of something to be precise." And the guy chuckled.

"Loki, if you don't let go of me I'll..." suddenly the hedgehog let go of his tail and quickly Knuckles stood back up again in time to have the wide end of a megaphone stuck into his face. "Listen carefully." The green guy said before putting his lips to the megaphone and shouting at the top of his voice "I'M... NOT... LOKI!... I'M... CALLED... STA...TIC!"

"Why you irritating rodent I'm gonna...!" and Knuckles grabbed him by the shoulder to keep him still while he prepared to punch. When he tried to drive it through however Static side stepped, took hold of Knuckles punching arm in one hand, put his arm around Knuckles waist and began leading him forward in a tango. They took three steps before Static tipped him up into his free arm.

"You come here often, big boy?" he asked trying to creep him out, and it worked because Knuckles pushed Static off him and felt his endless anger rising.

"Consider this date over!" Static said in mock outrage, "By the way, you are a terrible dancer and your breath smells!"

"I didn't come here to dance, I came here to..."

"FIGHT, FIGHT, FIGHT, FIGHT!" Static finished and a wrestling ring somehow materialised around them.

"Exactly" Knuckles said, finally the guy was getting it. Knuckles sank down and relaxed his body, ready to beat this guy into green mush.

"Ready?" Static said grinning a devilish grin.

"Ready!" Knuckles said matching the grin eager for some action.

"3... 2... 1..." Static counted down, then he flung out his arms and shouted "BRING ON THE WALL!"

"Say wha...?" Knuckles said confused, it was all he could say because the next moment a solid brick wall came crashing down on top of him splitting into a million broken bricks.

"Oh..." Static said as if realising a mistake "There isn't a hole in it, whoops." Knuckles pushed the remains of the broken wall off of him.

"Say, is that an advantage to being red?" Static said in a taunting voice "People can never tell when you're P. . Actually, scratch that, being red you always look P. ."

"Is that supposed to make me angry?" Knuckles said his knuckles shaking with rage.

"Yeah!" Static said wiggling his teeth.

"Congratulations!" quickly Knuckles tried to punch him directly in the face, he put so much power behind it he thought he'd be able to break his teeth. But instead Knuckles felt pain, and a lot of it when the Static guy opened his mouth and bit down on his hand and fingers stopping them dead. Knuckles yelled in pain and pulled his hand free away from this maniac's tile sized teeth.

"Hmm, a bit stringy, lack of taste, and hard to swallow." Static said like he was reviewing a meal off that stupid TV show, "So I'm giving this meal a 5 out of 10" and Static actually did hold up a square piece of card with a 5 on it.

Suddenly Static held up his hand and listened to the air as if he could hear something very far away that Knuckles could not.

"Sorry Knucklehead, but my dates calling." He spun around ready to leave, but Knuckles wasn't going to let this coward run away.

"Hey, come back and fight me you coward!" Knuckles shouted at him. Static froze as if Knuckles had just dealt him the ultimate insult.

"Coward?" Static said all sense of smiles gone from his face. He held up his hand and extended his little finger "I could defeat you with just my pinkie." Knuckles advanced on him menacingly until they were just inches apart.

"Yeah, well I'd like to see you try." Knuckles snarled.

"Very well." Static lifted his right hand, raised all but his pinkie and his thumb and it looked like he was going to flick Knuckles on the nose with it. But then suddenly Static lowered his hand and his aim to somewhere lower, and when he flicked Knuckles felt a sharp pain between his legs and he fell to the ground his hands cupping his crotch as Static had just flicked Knuckles in the groin. "Ha, oldest gag in the book!" and the Green Hedgehog took off and raced away.

Knuckles got to his feet in time to shout "Come back and face me in a fair fight!" before he suddenly slipped on something and crashed to the floor again, it took him a moment or two to realise he'd just slipped on a banana peel. Suddenly with an ear splitting boom Static was back but just so he could say. "Nah, I take it back. THAT was the oldest gag in the book." Then he blasted off again leaving Knuckles sore in more places then one.

* * *

Where has Sonic gone? Amy wondered and what must he think of the way she behaved wearing that... that... that... 'thing!' Her face had gone really red with embarrassment just thinking about it. Years and years of gently hacking away at Sonics resistance, slowly wearing him down, she was convinced she almost had him, then that thing, that stupid Mask took over her and made her into that disgusting creature!

Her stomach growled with protest at the unbelievable amount of junk she'd shovelled down her mouth. Bags and bags of pop corn, countless amounts of candy and sweets, rivers of strawberry milkshakes all from the movie theatre, she must've cleared them out of stock. Did she even pay for any of those treats she fed herself?

She didn't even offer anything to Sonic, he must think she's a gluttonous pig and the way it made her hold onto and hug him, stop him from walking more than two feet away from her like a pet on a leash... the Mask made her appear desperate!

But it had felt so right while wearing the Mask that she had wondered why she'd never acted so freely before in her life, but she wasn't in her right mind, the Mask had changed it for her. Amy's red face of embarrassment started to give way to a red face of burning anger and subconsciously her hammer appeared in her hands.

If she ever saw that cursed thing again she'd break it into toothpicks and burn it.

An odd thing appeared in front of her. A glass bowl that had ice cream in it and jelly and a spoon, it was attached to a gloved hand on a blue arm that was connected to a body with blue fur. But when she looked up into this persons eyes, expecting Sonic, and came face to face with Static she gave a thrilled scream of surprise and took a step back away from the Sonic impersonator.

"Hey Amy" Static grinned a familiar Sonic like grin. "Sorry I'm late, after saving the valley I had a bit of payback."

Amy's eyes looked from Static to the ice cream bowl. "For me?" She asked

"No, it's for some other cute hedgehog." Was Static flirting with her? Gingerly she took it from him and despite her protesting stomach she took a bite of the ice cream and jelly. Weirdly it tasted of snow and strawberry flavoured lake water.

"It's good." She lied forcing it down.

She suddenly had to drop the glass which shattered on the ground when Static came up to her and tipped her back in his arms.

"Give me a kiss, sweet cheeks" Static said clamping his lips over hers, amazingly Amy found herself fighting back against Static, the feeling of his rubbery lips on hers felt weird. Okay the first time she'd been pleasantly surprised that Sonic, even a part of him would kiss Amy that she went with it, now though since Tails had told her the Mask turned people into 'incomplete versions' of themselves, just shadows of their former selves made her realise she didn't know Static at all. She knew Sonic... a little, but Static was a total stranger.

Because of these thoughts she'd pushed Static's lips away from hers and automatically gave him a slap across the face and said angrily "Who are you calling sweet cheeks? You freak!"

"Come on, Amy" he said and his grip on her tightened. "You'll never have me as Sonic, but Static's got the charge for you." He wiggled his eye brows. Amy's eyes widened as the full comprehension of what he'd just said filtered into her mind, and she smacked him again across the face but this guy apparently couldn't take a hint.

"GET OFF ME!" and she kneed him between the legs, this made Static release his grip on her and she broke away. Something like this was a nice fantasy at first but she wanted Sonic, not some cheap knock off, and she told him this. "I want Sonic, not some pretender!"

"Pretender?" Amy suddenly had Static's arms around her again "I'm not trying to pretend to be Sonic, he's a spineless rat who is as cheesy as his grin." Amy's low fondness of Static dropped to an all time low now that he had insulted her sweetheart "I'm not trying to be Sonic, and Sonic is not like me. I'm Static!"

Amy tried to break away again but the green headed hedgehog wouldn't let go of her now.

"What's up with you? This is how you treat Sonic, I'm just mirroring the same affection!"

"That's a lie!" but Amy knew it wasn't. Did Sonic feel the same way about her as she felt about Static? Static was so forward that he either didn't know or didn't care about giving her some space, he was coming across as a clingy freak. Seeing Static act like this made her have an epiphany. All her life Amy had followed Sonic like this, the moment she saw him she'd clamped her arms around him and wouldn't let him go, she had become so obsessed with him that she practically wanted to breathe the same air as him. She'd assumed this would charm him, but now that it was being done to her she could see how repulsive it was. Did Sonic honestly feel the same about Amy?

Her thoughts turned at once back to Static. If Tails was right and the Mask just amplifies their primitive desires then she knew what Static wanted. At this point Amy decided to do what Sonic did and trick Static.

Instead of resisting she tried to take the lead and pulled Static's lips onto hers. Would he fall for this? Sonic was the one who'd created it and Static technically was Sonic in a way. But when she reached behind his head, found a fold that she assumed was where the two halves of the Mask joined together and pulled the Mask began to peel off.

Static tried to resist and pulled himself away from her to stop what she was doing but Amy was too determined. Once the Mask was half off Static's hardening face grinned, winked and said "When I'm next in town give me a call, sweet cheeks" _Yeah right, like I'll ever let Sonic get anywhere near this thing again!_

The Mask came off Sonic with a pop and her sweetheart fell back breathing deeply as if he'd been held underwater. The sudden feeling of the rubbery Mask becoming wood again made it snap out of her hands, it catapulted and the iron bar on it smacked her in the face and she was sure it broke her nose. She felt dizzy from that knock on the head and in her daze that was slowly clearing she tried to catch the Mask but when it landed in her hand she couldn't grip it fast enough to stop it bouncing out and back into the air, she reached out with the other hand but the same thing happened, this happened a couple of times before something happened she didn't want to happen.

One carelessly held out hand caused the Mask to fly from her hand and towards her face again, this time she was facing its inside and by the time she realised this it was already on her face like an alien from Aliens.

"NO, NO, NO NOT AGAIN GET OFF ME!" she screamed as she clawed at it but it wasn't yielding, it just spread over her head and joined at the back of her head again. "GET OFF, GET OFF, GET OFF ME!"

* * *

It took a couple of seconds for Sonic's head to clear but when his full personality was back in place he looked around frantically for Amy and the Mask. But when he saw it on Amy's face spreading over her like melting butter Sonic's sense of panic went into overdrive. He leant back and prepared to run away at the speed of sound until a voice made him stop.

"SONIC! SONIC!" It was Amy crying at him, reaching out her eyes pleading "SONIC, HELP ME! PLEASE DON'T LEAVE ME!" Tears were actually starting to stream down her face and Sonic was torn between helping Amy Rose and getting away from Amy Gaga. He hesitated, then he decided, he turned back and raced towards Amy and was just about to grab onto the Mask when something unexpected happened.

Amy threw her head and arms back and screamed, her fists clenched and Sonic felt a blast of energy radiate from her, a blast so powerful it knocked him off his feet and threw him a few feet away. It was as if the Mask was deliberately stopping Sonic from acting because that small delay was enough. Amy Rose started twirling in a whirling tornado of pink, red and green, it only lasted a second and before he knew it Amy Gaga was standing there in Amy Roses' place and she didn't look happy. She had her arms crossed over her chest her head was low, her face was frowning and her eyes were dark.

Sonic got to his feet and prepared to run, he turned and came face to face with Amy Gaga who had moved like lightning to stand behind him so close he could feel her breath on his face.

"Oh come on, give me a break!" Sonic said and Amy Gaga grabbed him by the arms tightly, her teeth gritted in anger.

"Is that a request?" her irises burst into flames. Sonic had rarely seen Amy angry at him, but Amy Gaga's anger frightened him and he didn't mind admitting that to himself. He really thought Amy was going to break him in two right there and then. "That was a dirty trick you played, taking advantage of me like that!" she probably meant tricking her earlier so he could remove the Mask.

"Well I'm sorry" Sonic said trying to sound as smooth as possible and tried to take the lead again "Come here and give me a kiss!"

Amy Gaga gritted her teeth, which instead of being the white, tile like teeth had grown to become sharp and pointy and as Sonic tried to kiss her Amy Gaga tried to bite him. Sonic pulled back from his embrace just quick enough to avoid her biting his nose. "I'M NOT FALLING FOR THAT AGAIN!"

Sonic took a step back feeling threatened and Amy took a step forwards and as her boot landed on the ground the world actually shook as the Mask translated that anger into the physical world.

"You may think Amy is creepy but you'll learn to love me!" Where he heck had this come from? Sonic thought, he'd known girls to say things that don't make sense but this one was confusing to Sonic. "If not now, you will once the Stockholm syndrome has set in!"

He did think Amy was a little creepy but that Amy was a Rose while this Amy was just Gaga.

"Sorry Amy Gaga, I'd prefer if Stockholm syndrome didn't set in, I already have athletes foot." Sonic said trying to maintain his cool while stepping away from Amy.

"What did you just call me?" oh boy, had he just said his nickname for her out loud?

"Amy" Sonic said simply.

"Amy Gaga you said! Amy Gaga?" Amy looked like she was about to explode, but then her face softened. "Amy Gaga? I like it! Because I am Gaga!" the pink hedgehog's clothes the faded out to be immediately replaced by a strange looking dress made of clear plastic bubbles and her dark green hair on her head had gone shinning white. "Gaga for you!" she opened her eyes but while she was saying this Sonic had already made a run for it. "HEY!"

Sonic was only racing away for 5 seconds when he rounded a corner and came face to face to Amy Gaga again. "Oh come on!" before he could do anything to change his direction Amy's trap had been sprung and her arms clamped around him like a venues flytrap around its prey. Sonic didn't know how much more of this he could stand.

"I think it's time to continue our date" Amy said in an ecstatic voice, then she began to speak very fast as she said "This time I'm going to take you somewhere I know you won't be able to run away, even if you could swim, and it'll be romantic and no one will interfere with it." She pressed her red eyes into his and said slowly in a serious tone "Even you!"

Before Sonic could even think of something to say they were gone. Amy Gaga was blasting her way across hills and mountains at the speed of light and continued on until they were over the ocean and even then she didn't stop. Sonic could see the land in the distance disappearing from sight so there was nothing but ocean all around.

After a couple of minutes she came to a stop in mid air. This time Sonic was actually hanging onto Amy for dear life. If he fell and sank like a stone nothing will save him, not even his speed boost ability would be enough to carry him back to land and this far out the water must be so deep he'd drowned before he even hits the bottom.

Amy relaxed her grip on him which made him grip her even tighter. "Not so keen to run away now, ay, my darling."

If Amy Gaga wasn't holding him up over a deep ocean miles away from land Sonic was seriously considering smacking her to get some sense through that rubber Mask and into her skull.

"Oh, I forgotten something that will make this extra romantic!" Amy said softly into his ear and she let go of him altogether. "Who's clingy now?" she giggled "You'll have to let go of me if you want the big surprise."

"Unless you're gonna raise Atlantis I'd rather stay here" he said, smoothing his voice out before adding "With you!"

"How dumb do you think I am?" Amy Gaga asked

Sonic was about to say out loud "Check back with me later on that one" but stopped himself saying it.

"Just wait here" Amy Gaga said ripping Sonic from her and letting him dangle above the ocean "I'll be right back" and she pulled him up and Sonic was catapulted into the air, he looked down in time to see Amy disappear under water. What was she doing?

Sonic rose higher and higher and for once he hoped to god that he couldn't see the sun rising nearby. If the sun came up while they were both here the Mask would come off and they'd both be stuck in the middle of the ocean miles away from anywhere.

Sonic came to a stop in mid air and for a second thought he had gone so far up that he was technically in space, but no luck, he began falling back down towards the sea, slow at first but faster and faster and faster. He tried to slow his descent but rolling into a ball and spinning but it was no good. In a few seconds he'd hit water at terminal velocity..

Suddenly there was a disturbance on the surface of the water and a jet of water erupted upwards and blasted into him catching him in mid fall and not only that began to push him back up. But it wasn't long before gravity took hold again and he was falling. Sonic took a deep breath and closed his eyes before he entered the water but was surprised when his body slammed into something large and solid that knocked his held breath out of him.

He was sliding down a wet, tilted surface with water crashing over it. Sonic's legs scrambled for a purchase to stop him sliding down this into the water and his feet landed on something with a clang.

Looking around at what he had landed on he could see dirty railings covered in rust, two lengths of large chain also rusty and discoloured and the cranks to turn them, mooring posts ships used to tie itself to a dock and what he was standing on was a hatch without a hatch cover and the surface he was on was made of very wet wood.

The thing started levelled out as it came up out of the water, clearly he was on an old shipwreck of some kind that Amy Gaga was raising back to the surface, the wreck of what he didn't realise until a dull grey life ring popped up out of the open hatch and began rolling across the slightly tilted deck towards him. It rolled in circles as it came to a halt and Sonic could get a clear view of the ships name on the life ring.

"You have got to be kidding me!" Sonic was both surprised and yet not surprised at the same time, what other ship would Amy Gaga raise? On the dull, grey life ring, in clear black letters was the name 'RMS TITANIC'

* * *

**To Be Continued...**

* * *

**Authors notes: **It's true that echidnas are one of the few mammals that lay eggs, the other being the platypus. Oddly a real echidnas hind feet are on backwards to help with digging but you don't see that with Knuckles. There are also other references to unusual parts of an echidna but you'll have to look it up for yourself. This ends the Zoology lesson.

The 'Bring on the wall' gag was based off a show from Japan and England called the Wall where the contestants are faced with an advancing wall with a weird shape cut out of it that their bodies have to adopt as it passes them by or get knocked into the water by it, though the wall is made of Styrofoam like substance not brick and the catchphrase of the presenter was 'Bring on the Wall!'

The 'Survey says' gag was based off a UK TV game show called Family Fortunes where the contestants have to answer a question like 'name something green' and have to come up with an obvious answer, the more obvious the answer the higher the score they got.

The gag where Static tries to flip a pen behind his ear is a famous trick by comedian Tim Vine who specialises in one liners, the point of the gag is he's not very good at it and has to restart the trick several times before he gets it right.

The Sonic Screwdriver gag was reference to Doctor Who, who has a sonic device called a Sonic Screwdriver, a device that can open any door and also has a ton of other uses and abilities.

Raising the Titanic was something I always intended to do in the story. Originally I wanted to release this on April of last year to commemorate the 100th anniversary of the loss of the Titanic. In fact I planned all of my fan fictions to have some reference to the Titanic but unfortunately I was busy around that time and the anniversary passed me by. Also don't worry, I'll make Amy Gaga put it back once she's done with it.

Some may think my relationship between Static/Amy Rose and Sonic/Amy Gaga to be strange but its supposed to be and trust me because there is method in my madness.

Hope you all enjoyed the new chapter

Cheers


	13. Shipwrecked Romances

**Act 4**

**Chapter 12**

**Shipwrecked romances.**

Sonic was now trapped like a rat on a sinking ship. If he were still on land he could take a chance and run away as a fast as he could and possibly get away from the insane Amy Gaga, but her new plan to stop him running meant he was truly trapped, surrounded by miles of water on a ship that was only remembered for doing what it was never supposed to do, sink.

Sonic had never really liked ships, not because he didn't have any faith in a vessels ability to stay afloat, he hated them because they were small and confined. He would be stuck to the man made and boring environment of a few decks. Sonic liked to be free to run and go wherever he wanted, whenever he wanted and feel the exhilarating sense of speed he could get up to in open country, on a ship he couldn't run very fast for fear of falling overboard. If this was a speed boat or a jet ski something that could get up to any kind of speed then they were okay, but a cruise ship was just a snail in comparison. So he had no fear that whatever vessel he was on could stay afloat, but considering this ship was a wreck that not ten minutes ago had laid in pieces on the bottom of the ocean having sunk over 100 years ago his faith in this ships ability to float wasn't very high.

After raising the R.M.S. TITANIC, both halves of the dead, broken ship, Amy Gaga had spent little time trying to fix it up to make it look like how it used to, but the attempt had been feeble. The back end which had broken away originally had somehow been reattached and looked like a mangled mess of twisted metal and girders, the ship looked like a bomb had gone off in the heart of its stern blasting the decks to shreds but Amy Gaga did her best to mask the damage but even from Sonic's position on the bow he could tell it was still a wreck, even in this pitch blackness. Amy Gaga had also erected four funnels that looked like they had mostly corroded away leaving mostly the weak, skeletal girders that held them up and the masts had been put back up as well making the raised TITANIC look like a ghost ship.

Sonic felt a shudder go down his spine, a lot of people had died on this ship and for Amy Gaga to disturb a gravesite like this, to effectively dig up a corpse just for her 'date' with Sonic then it just showed how disrespectful and loopy Amy Gaga was, and it added an extra layer of dislike Sonic had towards her.

Amy Gaga apparently had their 'date' on this ship all planned out. She wanted to re-enact the most romantic scenes from the movie they saw earlier, Sonic tried to protest but as always Amy didn't listen. First she wanted to do the 'I'm flying Jack' bit then she wanted to go into the belly of the ship to dance to an Irish folk band that Sonic could guess she'd conjure up herself. She wanted them to dress up and have dinner in first class –though as Sonic looked from the wrecked exterior of the TITANIC the interior would probably be in an even worse state.-

Sonic's mind had started to drift as Amy Gaga told him her plans for the night, it drifted onto how he was going to get out of this mess. If they were still here when the sun came up the Mask would fall off Amy, the magic would vanish and judging from the state of this ship it was held together and afloat only by the powers of the Mask, once that power was gone the ship was going to go down quicker than... well, quicker than the TITANIC... originally. But unfortunately Sonic was coming up with blanks on how to get out of this and Amy's constant attention to him was starting to wear heavily on his patience that he felt he was close to snapping.

At this moment however Amy Gaga had pushed Sonic up to the very prow of the ship, forced him to stand on the railings, spread his arms, she had a tight grip on his wrists and she said in wonder "I'm flying Sonic! I always feel like I'm flying when I'm with you." The ship wasn't even moving so there was no wind to blow on their faces and it was so dark you couldn't tell what was sea or sky, they were just staring into blackness, it was pathetic but that's not what Amy Gaga could see because she was enjoying herself.

"Oh Sonic, isn't this fun?" Amy said. Sonic silently hoped she didn't want to re-enact the whole movie because he knew how it ended for the male lead.

Suddenly Amy pulled Sonic down off the railings and spun him around to face her "Now let's not beat about the bush much longer Sweetie" she said grinning and looking at him with that lustful look again that sent a shiver down Sonics back. "How long have we technically been together, five, six, seven years?" she asked.

"More like five hours" Sonic said but Amy didn't take any notice of him.

"I'm 16 years old, and there comes a time when a girl and a guy seal their love." Sonic felt what remaining heat he had in his body drain away. "Sorry Amy, I don't know where to buy flowers on this ship." He said hoping to deflect her thoughts onto something else because he didn't like where this one sided conversation was going.

"I have these urges now that I'm more mature..." 'Mature? Yeah right' Sonic thought. "And I think, on this ship we should... you know..." she let it hang in the air.

"Abandon ship?" Sonic suggested

"No" Amy said a little irritated but pressed on. "I want to hold a little bundle in my arms."

"I know a good pet shop on shore." Sonic said but Amy only giggled.

"Oh, no, no, no, I want the two of us to become one" Amy Gaga said hoping this made Sonic understand. Sonic understood only too well and tried to push it aside again by saying "I think we should remain as two, that way we could still play cards."

"Okay I'll put it another way." Amy Gaga said, and she roughly grabbed Sonic by the ears and pulled his face towards her so her face was pressed roughly into his, they weren't kissing though. Her dreamy eyes became sharp and piercing, her teeth were bared hungrily and her eyes flashed red, and she practically screamed to him "I WANT A BABY NOW!"

Something in Sonics brain finally snapped at this. "Okay, I'm sick of this!" Sonic said angrily trying to push her away. "GET OFF ME! This has gone far enough!"

"Not to me it hasn't" Amy said suddenly playfully thinking Sonic was just fooling around, she pushed Sonic back onto the deck and she prepared to leap on top of him.

Sonic had finally decided enough was enough, he drew his legs into his body and as Amy Gaga tried to leap on top of him he sharply kicked the masked hedgehog in the stomach and she flew off him and slammed into the rusted railing, quickly Sonic got to his feet and fixed Amy with a fiery glare of dislike. He wouldn't have been so rough with Amy Rose but Amy Gaga just didn't know when to stop!

"GET THE HELL AWAY FROM ME YOU LOON!" Sonic shouted and clenched his fists ready to fight her off if it came to that.

Amy Gaga stood up but she did not look angry, or furious in the slightest. Instead she looked shocked, her eyes were wide in astonishment and were gradually growing wetter. "You mean you don't love me anymore?" tears started to well up in her eyes.

Ah, there was another weakness Amy Gaga had apart from being gullible Sonic noticed as a rare, cruel smile was curling up on his face. He folded his arms, closed his eyes, made his face an unreadable mask of blank emotion and turned away from her. "I never loved you, ever!" Okay it was a bit strong Sonic admitted and quickly he added to it by saying "Amy Rose I... liked." He just knew he was going to regret saying that in the morning "You're just an irritating stalker."

In an instant Amy Gaga zoomed in front of him waving her arms her scarlet eyes still wet as she held back her tears. "BUT... BUT... BUT... BUT..." she repeated again and again before she finally found her voice "But... but I'm way better than Amy ever was! Amy was only one girl, I can be anything you want!" Amy Gaga got onto her knees and was practically pleaded to him, Sonic only found this pathetic. "Do you like you're girls to be blue?" her fur instantly turned blue "Green, purple, blond?" she recited every colour there was and her fur turned to match it, including a handful of shades Sonic didn't even know existed. It was unusual but he remained defiantly unimpressed.

"Do you like tall girls?" and quickly her entire form ballooned until she stood at the height of a fifty foot giant. Sonic had to retreat from her because he feared the extra weight would sink the TITANIC, again. It was already starting to pitch and yaw to port and starboard under the extra weight.

Seeing him flee she added in her now larger, booming voice "Okay, do you like your girls petite?" and with a loud pop giant Amy Gaga vanished. Seconds later a red, pink and green speck had landed on the tip of Sonic's nose. Sonic's eyes crossed to bring tiny Amy Gaga into focus, she stood there on his nose still pleading with him at pixie size and in a squeaky pixie voice but still Sonic remained impassive, and even to add insult to injury he gently blew her off his nose. She ballooned back to her normal size at once.

"I can give you anything you want, anything you want I can get you, what do you want? What, what, what?!" she began to sob tears starting to escape her eyes and run down those green, rubbery cheeks.

"I want Amy Rose back" Sonic said at once.

"Okay!" Amy pulled on the Mask and Sonic thought she was going to remove it, but instead she again let it snap back so her head turned pink and she looked exactly like Amy all the way down to her red dress and emerald eyes, yet when she spoke she still had those freakishly large teeth. "You want Amy Rose, you got Amy Rose!"

"No, I want the real Amy Rose not someone pretending to be her" Sonic said sternly.

"But, but I am Amy Rose. You heard Tails, we're one and the same, just different sides of the same coin!"

"Wrong side for me" Sonic said dismissing her with a wave of his hand and Amy Gaga changed back into her usual green head and school girl attire. "You can try to imitate her all you want. Amy is one of a kind, you're just a copy cat, a cheap imitation, a..." he didn't know if it was wise to say this last thing but by the time he'd said it, it was too late to change his mind "...a freak."

"A... a... a... a... freak?" Amy's voice said distantly, tears began flowing slowly down her cheeks as her hands began to shake and her body shivered as if she was cold "but... but... but... but... but... but..." she repeated lost for words but she found some and said in a very quiet, yet controlled emotional voice "but... but... but... I... I... I love you..."

That one sentence actually tugged at Sonics heart strings more than anything Amy had ever said or done in her life, even without the Mask. There was true emotion behind those three words, usually Amy would just screech them out at him but this was the first time Sonic had known Amy to say this and sound like she genuinely meant it from her heart and not just words she constantly sprouted through her mouth from her hormones.

Sonic suddenly felt very guilty and angry at himself for acting like a total douche bag to her after she was bearing her soul to him. He felt even more guilty for what he was about to do, his next word, just one single word he was about to utter he was now aware would be like plunging a dagger right through Amy's soul. He was shaking slightly himself and he looked away because he couldn't bear to look into those eyes, Amy's eyes. His insides squirmed as he forced his mouth to say flatly and without any regret or emotion.

"Tough!"

That was the last dagger Amy Gaga's heart could take, she stood frozen to the spot for a few seconds totally stunned, silence followed and she just stared at him like he was a much loved pet that had suddenly turned vicious and attacked. Then her arms began to shake and as if she was made of glass her form fractured and cracked, she smashed and fell apart like a glass statue, shards piling up on the floor. This was probably a metaphor for her delusions shattering. The dust settled and stayed there for ten seconds before they quickly reformed her, Amy's lower lip was trembling, her eyes leaked tears she was trying to force back as her big eyes continued to stare, almost pleading at Sonic or waiting for him to show weakness, pity or to jump at her and say 'April Fool' or something like that, but when he didn't concede her legs buckled inwards and she collapsed to her knees, arms limp, she threw her head back and erupted into tears. She whaled as literally arcing waterfalls of tears erupted from her eyes like fountains and splashed onto the still soaked deck. She took a deep, wheezing breath and cried some more.

Guilt flooded Sonic as he watched this teenage girl kneeling there whaling like a baby, he watched for a good couple of minutes before he took a step forward towards her but Amy Gaga held out her hand and he halted "Go away! Leave me alone!" and without another word she ran away, zooming across the deck and vanishing down the ships promenade in a split second.

Oh boy, had this backfired? Sonic asked worried. If she left the ship then he was doomed, if she was still onboard and the sun came up the Mask would come off and they were both doomed, on the other hand if she was still on board and he apologised to her and she mistook that for acceptance, he was in fact doomed. But after 2 minutes the TITANIC stubbornly remained floating and Sonic guessed Amy was still onboard. Sonic decided to bide his time, he knew from experience that when people break down like this it was best to leave them alone for a minute or two to let out their frustrations, he didn't wait long however because he was aware the sky was starting to become lighter on the horizon.

* * *

Robotnik slumped down into his chair which again groaned at his bulk, and faced his massive computer, exhausted. He was lucky he had a secret base in the mountains, he had secret bases everywhere, some so secret Robotnik had forgotten where he'd sent some of his construct-o-bots to build them but he remembered this one. It was a perfect duplication of his last base all the way down to the last detail except for the absence of a couple of things, mostly just the shattered remains of what was once Metal Sonic which was still being examined by machines many miles away in the old lab.

Tapping at his computer he connected it from this base to the computer at the other base and accessed Metals logs remembering he'd plugged the robots positronic brain into the mainframe to download and extract information. Some of the information had been recovered but none of it useful, the most undamaged part of his memory was what related to battle statistics. It was part of Metals programming, he studied who he was fighting, usually Sonic and would record, store data and learn from it to alter his battle style to suit the new opponent. All Robotnik's guard bots and battle drones possessed this ability for all the good it did him as Sonic just kept learning new skills or altered his tactics himself to defeat his robots, though mostly it was because the hedgehog was too quick for their electrical brains to compute a strategy, which they did quick enough, but lost out when they tried to implement the new tactics.

Sonic always defeated his robots usually in the first couple of second they saw him, not giving them time to record data, but those that survived longer could record the holes in his attack plans. Hopefully based of the battle data he could retrieve from Metal he could do the same for Static and build a robot that was better suited to battle and possibly defeat him but there was a problem, Static was far too unpredictable, that was the one thing he was learning as he trawled through battle data about the green headed hedgehog, Robotnik had also witnessed it firsthand. Static may not be Loki as he claimed but he did possess powers and abilities that mirrored the mythical Loki, maybe they were just similar but that ability to pull any object from thin air made Static very unpredictable.

Robotnik raised his gloved hands and rubbed a knuckle across a none existent chin as he pondered this, then he leaned back in his chair and pressed his fingers together as the gears in his brain of QI 300 whirled around at sonic speed. Perhaps he was going about this the wrong way, perhaps using logic simply wasn't good enough, logic depended on predictability and Static had proven time and again he was nowhere near predictable, how very Sonic like of him. So Robotnik decided he must build a machine that could be unpredictable in exactly the same way, not in a whacky way like Static, but in a battle way. Robotnik smiled, Metal was powerful but his attacks were too predictable, it was the same for all his machines, they eventually fell into a pattern that Sonic then exploited, Sonic predicted his robots movements and adapted his battle style to best defeat them.

A plan formed in Robotniks mind, it was a brilliant plan, a plan so brilliant it could only have been hatched by the evil Dr. Eggman himself.

With his bristly moustache quivering he typed in a code, a code that gave him access to the memory and personality centres for all of his brilliant, surviving robotic creations, including several that had been built but were sadly awaiting activation when Robotnik needed them. He accessed the memory cores of one of his toughest robots, he was going to introduce some new concepts into this new machine he had been working on for so long, it was another battle hard robot that was supposed to match Sonic. In short it was another version of Metal Sonic, Metal 3.0 to give him his full name since he was the third Metal Sonic to be produced, or was he the fourth? Robotnik had lost count and didn't care anyway.

The robot looked almost exactly like old Metal down to the polished paint job. But now as Robotnik ordered his production facilities many miles away from his current location the immoral scientist made changes, added new things to Metal 3's armour and weapon facilities. Only one change was cosmetic however and that was to the exterior paint job and when Robotnik was finished he'd christen and then release 'Metal Static' on the world and Static the Hedgehog would know what the price was for crossing Dr. Ivo Eggman Robotnik.

* * *

Cautiously Sonic climbed the steps that ascended from the forward well deck of the TITANIC and he climbed up onto the promenade that ran the length of the raised wreck. He went down the starboard side peering into misty windows looking for where Amy Gaga had ran off to. The ship was still floating so he was certain she was still onboard, but where? This was a 900 foot long ship with plenty of places to hide.

It was strange, but for once Sonic felt genuine emotions for that funny little girl, this stalker he preferred only as a friend. Part of this was because Sonic thought her crush on him was like a fan girls crush on a pop star, like she only wanted to go out with him to impress her friends, he thought she just saw him as a trophy boyfriend and that's why he never took her seriously. But now Amy Gaga had showed more than just fan girl love, she had bared her soul, the core of Amy Rose herself, this made it seem to Sonic like Amy Roses' obsession with him went deeper than just simple fan girl love, she genuinely loved him, something which he never thought Amy seriously did for one second. Now Sonic was feeling something else, something he didn't expect to feel at all, fear. It wasn't a fear of rejection, it was a fear of loss, though he didn't like Amy Gaga, not one atom of her, he did however like Amy Rose and was only just now realised how much he did like her and how much it would hurt him if he lost her.

He walked far back along the ship until he came to the place where the ship had split into two, the deck didn't look stable here and he doubted it would support his weight. Sonic also found out how Amy Gaga had stuck the two halves back together, the two halves were held together by strips of duct tape. That was one internet meme proven right.

Sonic doubled back further forward and went into a side door that, according to the end of the movie that shared the same name of this ill-fated vessel, lead him into that large, posh staircase.

It was cold, dark and silent on the inside of the TITANIC, the only real sound was the whirling of the air as wind flowed through the derelict vessels interior and whistled through gaping holes and wreckage. In the semidarkness Sonic could barely see anything and he gave a startled yelp that echoed around inside of the TITANIC when his foot tried to land on something that wasn't there, the floor had just vanished!

He was about to fall forward into some kind of pit, luckily he bent his leg that was on stable ground and launched himself onto the other side of the pit before he could fall into it. The pit was large and deep and by the look of it was right were there staircase should be. But the stairs had gone, just gone! Leaving a large pit where they had once stood. It had probably rotted away, or more likely since wood floats it ripped itself out as the ship sank over 100 years ago. From the bowels of the ship Sonic heard a loud creak from the settling hull as if the ship were a snoozing beast that had just moaned and stretched itself.

Sonic had seen enough of this corpse of a ship to see that even being wrecked it had an eerie kind of beauty about it. In places long stalactite like formations drooped from the ceilings everywhere. In the semidarkness it looked a little scary but as his eyes adjusted he could see past that to how it looked underneath. It was like a ruin that had been reclaimed by nature, those temples in the mystic ruins for example where moss and planet life had grown over to reclaim it, that's how the TITANICS wreck looked to him, sure it was a total wreck but there was something about it. Though it looked pretty out of the water Sonic was going to make Amy Gaga put it right back where she got it and how she'd found it.

A ghostly whale came up the pit where the lost staircase once existed. It was an echoing cry that sounded at first like a ghost but the longer he heard its echo he realised it was the echoing cry of Amy Gaga, she was on a lower level of the ship.

Without any fear or thought that this ship might go down while he was in its bowels Sonic leapt down into the pit and landed cat like on the lower deck where the whaling was coming from. He then went deeper down the corridor which was littered with fallen debris and dust. Sonic took back what he said earlier, TITANIC may look pretty from the outside but the deeper he went into it the more it looked like this ship came from something out of a nightmare, the large settled dust was piled up like sand dunes and coupled with the stalactites it made him feel like he was wandering around the bowels of a giant sea monster because with the atmosphere being soaked, cold and dark everything had an odd, creepy organic texture to it. The growths were larger now and hanging down like bars trying to prevent his advance forwards. The hull of the ship creaked again loudly adding to the impression he was inside something's intestines.

It didn't take him long to locate Amy Gaga because the crying told him the general direction to go and the streams of tears coming from a specific room on his left told him she was in there. If she didn't stop crying those buckets of tears Sonic suspected Amy Gaga would re-sink the TITANIC.

Sonic peered inside through the open door and saw Amy Gaga sitting on a slowly rotting bed crying her eyes out, she had a big tub of ice cream held in one arm and an ice cream scoop in the other, between sobs she dipped the scoop into the ice cream, pulled out a large serving and shoved it into her mouth all at once and swallowed it in one go then began whaling again, rocking herself forwards and backwards as she sobbed.

Sonic had never seen a more pathetic sight, what was more pathetic was the layout of the room she was in. The water logged room was lit by many candles, some of which looked like they were supposed to release perfume but these had been thrown at the wall and had gone out in the soggy, water logged carpet. On the mantelpiece was a picture of Sonic and Amy Gaga, one that Sonic had no recollection of when it had been taken. It was clearly something Amy Gaga had conjured herself because Sonic was smiling sweetly with his arms around Amy Gaga's waist. Such a pose had never, ever occurred except in Amy Gaga's delusions.

Amy Gaga got up, walked towards the small picture and picked it up, she gazed longingly at it before hugging it to her chest and sobbing more before going back to eat more ice cream. Suddenly her eyes darted to look directly at Sonic and she screamed.

"AHHHHhh!" she turned her back on him "Don't look at me!"

Sonic took a step into the room and Amy whirled around and threw the picture at him, Sonic had to duck to avoid it. "LEAVE ME ALONE!" she shrieked as she suddenly had a vase in her hand that she threw at Sonic and again the hedgehog dodged it but didn't retreat, in fact he advanced.

"GO AWAY!" Amy Gaga yelled as a porcelain statue materialised in her hand and she threw that at him, but again he dodged and kept slowly advancing towards her

"GET LOST!" she kept producing objects to throw at him and with each one she threw Sonic avoided as she shouted insults, swear words and foul threats that had the general meaning of 'GET OUT!', Then she had her hammer in her hands and she swung and flung that at him too "GO AWAY! I HATE YOU!"

Sonic realised what he was about to do technically wasn't cool and normally he wouldn't have done it, but no one was looking and instinctively it seemed the right thing to do anyway. When he finally got up to her he reached out and put his arms around her willingly and pulled her towards him and gently hugged her, this was more to get her to stop throwing things at him and for her to gently calm down then a show of affection. All the while Amy screamed and struggled "GET OFF ME! I HATE YOU, I HATE YOU! **I HATE YOUUUUU!**". She struggled and whaled like a baby trying to make Sonic let her go, and with the powers of the Mask she could certainly make him do that but as soon as Sonic was holding her all the anger and defiance seemed to just drain from her. Amy's arms then gently wrapped around Sonics neck and she started to sob over his shoulder.

Only after her whales faded to gentle sobs and she rested her head on his shoulder did Amy Gaga speak again "I love you" she said gently and like last time the emotion sounded genuine. Sonic opened his mouth but couldn't bring himself mirror the affection because he didn't want Amy Gaga's attitude to U turn and start this whole mess all over again, so he settled for just saying "I know." Amy noticed this.

"What did I do wrong?" Amy Gaga asked after a while in a defeated tone. Sonic thought for a moment and wondered if he should or even if he could answer this, but an answer escaped his mouth anyway "You were trying too hard." Gently Sonic swayed her from side to side. This wasn't doing anything for his 'coolness' image, but again no one was looking so he just rolled with it.

"Why won't you love me?" Gaga said in a slightly whaling voice "I can be whatever girl you want, Amy Rose can only be one thing!"

"I don't think you'd understand" Sonic replied. According to Tails, Amy Gaga was just Amy's ID, it was devoid of Ego and Super Ego and was driven only by its basic instincts and emotions, he doubted very much if Amy Gaga fully understood what love was in the first place, the only love she understood was the making of.

"But I want to understand! I want you!" Amy said at little forcefully. Sonic was thinking, trying to choose his words carefully, he was more used to fighting than talking, any conversation he had was usually short and to the point. "Why do you want Amy Rose over me?"

"You won't understand" Sonic said "cos' you're not a full person" this was half true, the other half was that he didn't know how to explain it himself. "You're a part of what makes up Amy Rose, maybe an important part of her, but on your own you're just... incomplete..."

Silence passed between them for a couple of seconds before Amy Gaga said "You're rubbish at explanations" Sonic couldn't stop a small smile escape him. He could sense that tears were welling up in her eyes again. "You want me to take the Mask off don't you?" Sonic didn't speak, he wanted to say 'No' because he wanted to get back to shore and for her to put this rusting hull back on the sea bed before that happened but instinctively he knew it was the wrong thing to say.

"Yes" he said softly and Amy Gaga shuddered "But I feel free while I'm like this!" _Yeah, but then I'm not free_ Sonic thought to himself. "All I want is for you to like me!" she sobbed. Sonic just felt his insides continue to squirm, wondering what to say next.

"You don't need magic powers to impress me" Sonic said letting her go and looked into those crazy eyes which had changed to a shade of emerald, Amy's original eyes. "Just be yourself" and Sonic winked at her, again she over reacted and tears gushed from her eyes as she wrapped her arms around him gently and sobbed. Once she had settled down again she asked "You liked me how I was before?" Sonic nodded and hoped it would be enough.

"If that's what you want, all I want is to make you happy" Amy Gaga said with the tips of her fingers pressed onto her rubbery cheeks, she then reached behind her head.

"Whoa! WAIT!" Sonic snapped grabbing Amy Gaga's arms. "If you want to make me happy you can do two things before changing back." Sonic used the tips of his fingers to gently lift Amy's sad head up by the chin so she was looking at him. "I want you to put this ship back exactly where you found it" before Amy Gaga could protest Sonic cut her off "It's a graveyard and defacing a graveyard isn't cool." She didn't seem to understand the idea of having respect for the dead but she nodded anyway.

Sonic looked over Amy's shoulder through the misty windows and could see the distant darkness of the horizon begin to light up very slowly, the sun was approaching.

"Second" Sonic said quickly "I want you to return both of us to dry land. Then I want you to remove the Mask." Amy Gaga nodded.

"Can you just do one tiny thing for me?" Amy Gaga asked smiling sweetly "When I turn back..." and said in a much less whiny tone "Will you please go out with me? Please?" Sonic didn't know what to say at first as he was caught off guard and he almost said 'no' but a small part of him held him back. Instead he just said nervously "Umm... Yeah, okay, I guess".

Once that was said Sonic became aware that the floor he was standing on was fast starting to tilt downwards towards the bow of the ship and Sonic had the feeling you get while you're in an elevator going down. Sonic was about to put two and two together when Amy Gaga kissed Sonic so suddenly he was momentarily dumbfounded, not that she had kissed him, but that this time the kiss hadn't been like a smothering pillow of affection, it was much gentler and smoother. It was either like a goodbye kiss, or a kiss supposed to seal a deal. Why was Amy never satisfied with a simple handshake?

Once they broke apart she grabbed him tightly by the wrists and pulled him so fast through the ship he was back on the top deck before he knew it. Sonic could detect the deck was becoming steeper and stepper very fast, the TITANIC was sinking again but at a faster rate than it did over 100 years ago. "Keep your arms and legs tucked in!" she called as she raced towards the rising stern of the TITANIC which was at a very high angle, so high that Sonic was having trouble maintaining speed, but it was no problem for Amy Gaga who pulled him along by the hand like this steepening incline was level ground, and once she reached the end of the ship she came to a stop where the stern railings had once been and with a massive heave Sonic flew past her and she let go of his arms.

As Sonic flew high into the air he watched as within seconds the TITANIC had slid once again back into the black abyss. He rose higher and higher into the air until yet again he felt gravity take its hold and begin to pull him straight back down. He didn't panic, why would he? He knew Amy wouldn't let him die, any moment she'd be here to save him. Ten seconds past, twenty seconds, thirty and still no sign of Amy.

Sonic assumed he had about a minute until he hit the water, but because of how dark it was with no light source but the stars Sonic was 30 seconds out and he crashed into the water before he had expected it. Though he breathed in the moment he felt ice cold water rush up his body he couldn't take in his lungs maximum capacity before the water closed over him. He flailed his arms desperately trying to get back to the surface but knew no matter how hard he swam he was going down like a stone.

There was a burning sensation in his lungs as they processed the last of the oxygen in his system and they screamed for more oxygen, more air, something Sonic couldn't give them. He tried to remain calm and cool about the situation but there was no way he could escape this time because he knew he'd drowned before he hit the bottom and even if he could reach the bottom he was aware that the water pressure down there would crush him anyway. His lungs rang wanting more air, Sonic had to breathe even if it was water, his lungs wanted him to breathe and didn't care what went into his lungs.

As Sonic's body gave up its struggle to stop his lungs breathing he felt not cold water cascade down into his lungs, but freezing, cold air. Water was flowing from his ears and he could hear the crashing waves that told him he was above water again, and in Amy Gaga's arms.

"What took you so long?" Sonic coughed with irritation.

"Ever tried to fit a TV perfectly back into its box?" Amy Gaga asked "Similar problem, I found that wreck in so many pieces I almost forgot where everything went."

Within seconds Amy Gaga had brought Sonic back to the nearest beach. It was still night time and by Sonics watch it would be a good few hours before the sun came back up, but it looked like this nightmare was about to end as Amy Gaga set him down.

Sonic then waited, waited for Amy Gaga to fulfil his wishes and remove the Mask from her face and change back and end this but she was looking at him again with those green eyes that were Amy Roses' rather than Amy Gaga's.

Then Amy Gaga reached behind the back of her head and said "If this is really what you want" and she began to pull the Mask away. It was very stubborn, the wooden menace gripped her features so tightly Sonic feared it would rip Amy's face away. Its rubbery surface began to harden and Amy's eyes disappeared into the blank eye sockets, the Mask was crusting over as rubber became wood and with a great gust blasting from Amy her form disappeared into whirls of colour and sound, then the Mask began to come away properly and with a loud snap it let go.

Sonic prepared himself for Amy Rose to run at him at full speed and embrace him in a hug that was tight but not as rib shattering as Amy Gagas'. He waited for Amy to shout and scream about how she was glad to see Sonic and how frightened she had been etc, etc,etc. But Sonic was surprised when no embrace happened, there was no squealing, no yelling. Amy Rose just stood there silently and rather meekly turning the Mask over in her hands so she faced its face. There was a sad look in her eyes and when she turned to look at Sonic, he noticed some of that wide eyed, fan girl affection was missing.

Slowly she walked up to Sonic and held out the Mask for him to take. "Here" she said flatly with an edge to it that made it sound like she was annoyed with him "this is what you wanted isn't it?" Sonic looked down at it and noticed her change in attitude towards him. Usually she'd give him something like this excitedly in a dreamy voice hoping he'd go out with her, now she was shoving it at him as if she didn't care anymore. When Sonic didn't make to take it she thrust it hard into his stomach so sharply Sonic emitted a loud "oof!" and his hands raced up to grab it, then Amy let go, turned on her heels and began walking away in a mood.

"Amy?" Sonic said and Amy didn't reply or stop, she just kept walking keeping her back to him. Sonic felt another pang of guilt. In his quest to get the Mask off Amy Gaga he remembered the dagger he'd had to force into Amy's soul to get it off her, this made Sonic feel rotten and ashamed of what he'd done, but didn't she get the message when he said he 'liked' Amy Rose but didn't like Amy Gaga? What was wrong with her?

He decided to make it up to her so Sonic suddenly used his super speed to appear in front of Amy, he flashed her one of his cocky grins that was supposed to make her feel better and asked "Hey, how about that date you wanted?"

At first Amy said and did nothing, she just stood there staring at him and not in a dreamy way, more like he was an irritating fly she wanted to swat. Without a word Amy walked over towards the sea to a red, sandcastle bucket that had been left in the sand there, probably by a child earlier in the day. She knelt down and scooped up the sandcastle bucket that already had wet sand in it and filled it full of water from the sea and for a second looked at it like she found it more fascinating then Sonic, what was she doing? She then gestured for Sonic to come closer by contracting her index finger at him, he did as she asked, Sonic didn't like that look in her eyes. Then the blue blur was left in shock as once he was close enough Amy had lifted the bucket above his head, tipped it up so the water fell and splashed down onto him soaking him from head to toe, then she slammed the bucket on top of his head and gave the bucket's bottom a hard bang with her fist to jam it onto his head and to make the wet sand fall from the bottom of the bucket onto his head.

Sonic was just confused and astonished as Amy's eyes gave him a deep acid look that had nothing but loathing for him in them, there were no tears in her eyes as she said "Does that answer your question you insensitive, air headed, rat!" Then she turned and stamped away in a rage leaving Sonic cold, wet and utterly confused with a sandcastle jammed onto his head.

This was a first for Sonic, it was a situation he'd never been in before and didn't know how to handle. Had Amy, that is Amy Rose just blown him, Sonic the Hedgehog off? What weird universe had he stumbled into this time? Sonic gazed at the Mask, and then back at the retreating Amy, then back at the Mask and said out loud in a confused voice. "What the heck did I do?"

* * *

**TO BE CONTINUED...**

* * *

**Authors notes:** Remember earlier when I said I had aged the characters up to make a certain scene in this fan fiction less creepy? You just found the chapter that contains it and its probably obvious what bit I'm refering to. I wrote this scene for two reasons, first of which is I just like torturing characters sometimes, lol. The second is that it is necessery for Sonic to break the delusions of Amy Gaga but Sonic himself would never really hurt either Amy Rose or Gaga unless she planned on going too far, which she was. It was just unfortunate however that he's done too good a job at it.

This is chapter also symbolises a change in Sonic and Amy's relationship, since they are now 16 and 18 respectfully they will have altered and evolved and their attitude towards each other should have evolved with them.

I do believe that Sonic likes Amy and is cool with keeping her around, however he views her as a fan girl and he thinks Amy thinks of him in the same way a teenage fan girl of Justin Bieber sees the pop star and say that they love him but they love him only for his looks and because he's famous, they don't really love Bieber for his music -Which IMO is dreadful- or the person himself. Sonic also appears to be the type of person who doesn't have time for fake people or friends which is one reason why he doesn't want to get too close to Amy.

However I also think Amy Rose does have deep feelings for Sonic but she always comes across as over excited when near him and never sounds sincere -perhaps due to some kind of trauma in her past that was never explained in any cannon fiction as far as I'm aware- and that's what makes Sonic think she's just a clingy fan girl, plus because I've never known Sonic to be an attention seeker in the games its also another reason why he's reluctant to get too close to her. In other words, at least a part of their relationship is based off incorrect assumptions about each other.

But thats just how I see it anyway.

Hope you guys enjoyed the new chapter

Cheers


	14. Enter Metal Static

**Chapter 13**

**Enter Metal Static**

Amy sat behind a rock and wallowed in self pity, not because of what Amy Gaga made her do but for what Sonic had done to her. Her Sonic, her darling Sonic, Sonic who was so close to her heart at one point. She reached up and felt her chest, he had manipulated her only to turn around and sink a dagger so deep into her heart it felt like the life was falling out of it.

Her heart was breaking.

She knew when Sonic said he'd hated her he was talking about Amy Gaga, not Amy Rose, but Amy Gaga is like the flip side of the coin that is Amy Rose. So when Sonic said he didn't like Amy Gaga he meant he didn't like her at all. She hated Sonic with all her broken heart, she wanted to go home and rip down all the pictures and photos she had of him, rip up all the drawings she made relating to him and burn all of it. She would gladly even erase her own memory of Sonic the Hedgehog if it would mean that she didn't have to feel this deep well of rejection again.

Amy tried to take her mind of the that stupid blue rat for a second and think about something else, pink, she likes pink, and red dresses, and make up and her friend Tails, who was also a friend of Sonic. No, think about another friend, Knuckles, who knows Sonic. No another, Cream and Cheese, who both know Sonic! Sonic! Sonic! Sonic! Sonic! It was hopeless, she couldn't think of anything that didn't have some relation to Sonic!

That's when something hit her. She couldn't just delete Sonic from her life. All her friends were also Sonic's friends. In fact she had no real friends of her own, the only friend she wanted was Sonic and true she befriended his friends but only because she didn't have any of her own. Whether she liked it or not, Sonic was at the heart of her life. Sonic had been her life for the past 8 years, and this made Amy sad.

For years she'd been chasing Sonic, trying to get him to at least try to love her. But he refuses to talk about himself and though he likes company of friends, including her, he is never interested in anyone else. He never asks her any question about herself, about her appearance or anything. She could turn herself green and Sonic wouldn't look twice. She was sick of him using her, tugging at her heart strings to get her to do something for his own ends. He was a selfish, immature little brat who wasn't worth her time nor energy. How stupid did she have to be to have to need a tainted lump of wood to show this fact to her face?

Maybe Sonic thought her storming off was just a game, that it was a tantrum that would pass and by tomorrow mroning she'll be running at him ready to wrap her arms around him asking him to forgive her -when she's actually done nothing wrong- begging for forgiveness so he won't leave her. Well no way, this had been the final straw, she never, ever, ever wanted to see Sonic again, NEVER, EVER, EVER! But though she screamed this in her mind the feeling wasn't strong enough to explode out of her mouth.

She'd realised earlier this night thanks to Static/Sonic that it was very creepy to not give someone personal space as Static had with her, it was also the same thing Amy did to Sonic which gave this epiphany more of a ring. Everything she'd done to try to get Sonics attention hadn't worked, actually it had worked to get his attention but it hadn't attracted Sonic to her, it had just 'weird-ed' him out, she was just so desperate to be loved by him that she went gaga every time she saw him, and that's what Amy Gaga was to her, her obsession, her impulses, her lust which had sprouted arms and legs. Sonic had called her a freak... and he was right! She was a freak! Amy buried her hands in her face and continued to weep.

She was really just a friendless, moaning, unloved, immature, little freak. Something else clicked into her head. Deep down, what she really wanted from Sonic was love, and she wanted Sonic or someone to love her in return. She smothered him with love in the hopes he would return it, but he keeps blowing her off or not taking her seriously. Didn't he see she needed it? To heal emotional scares that were years old. She decided not to go down that branch of memory lane, she had a ton of bad memories she'd prefer to screen and forget about. Her past was painful for her and her present wasn't much brighter either. Her whole life was chasing after one guy who didn't seem to acknowledge her love, her flirting or even –as she sometimes felt- her existence.

She hated Sonic but she also hated her past, she hated her present, she hated Amy Gaga, she even despised Amy Rose herself, and for the first time in her life she realised one truth she had been avoiding and running away from all these years.

_I am wasting my life_...

* * *

Sonic waited on the beach where Amy had left him, he was aware both he and Amy were still thousands of miles away from home and without any transport Amy would be stranded, though he wasn't going to piggy back her back home he was going to wait and guide her back home at least.

He lay in the sand and set the Mask down beside him and gazed up at the stars thinking and he had a lot to think about.

He wasn't moving from this spot for another reason, a reason that complimented a shift in his mentality. He wanted something, something he'd never wanted so badly before in his life, something he never wanted before now, he couldn't quite put his finger on it and he couldn't believe he was even thinking this, but he wanted Amy Rose.

Actually more specifically, he wanted her forgiveness. This was odd considering all the times he's humiliated Knuckles, the times he nearly got people killed, all the damage he does while having fun, not once did he ever say sorry and not once wanted forgiveness from anyone. He was saving the world after all. But this time he wanted forgiveness, he didn't understand why, as far as he was concerned he'd done nothing wrong, it was only natural to want to get away from such a grabby, clingy person like Amy Gaga, but that was a much younger part of himself speaking, the older part of him knew that while doing this he'd hurt Amy Rose's feelings. Amy who had stood by him along with Tails in the fights against Robotnik, though she's pretty useless in a fight it was just nice to have someone who appreciated what he did, for all these worlds and places he'd saved.

The world knew about Dr. Robotnik and his mad schemes to take over the world, but the world didn't take him seriously half the time believing all his massive egg carriers and robots to be just for show. Plus he'd bragged on for years about taking over the world and yet had never managing it despite his technological superiority, the only reason he'd failed was because of Sonic the Hedgehog constantly stopping him but Sonic himself was relatively unknown, very few knew it was him who'd defeated Robotnik and saved the planet and its people so many times. He actually preferred it like that, he may act like it but he's not too big on getting a lot of attention, in fact his life is pretty solitary if you didn't count Tails.

Tails was his best friend and could help him in these adventures but Amy was like a representative of the people, someone who appreciated him saving the world on the worlds' behalf. Usually someone saving the world would gain instant fame, glory or even money, but Sonic didn't have nor want any of those things, fame wasn't his thing and as far as he was concerned fame was just for people who craved attention and Sonic didn't crave attention at all, he only did what he did... for fun he guessed, and as long as one person thanked him for saving the world or knew of the deeds he'd done then it was all the gratitude he needed from it, and that person had almost always been Amy Rose.

However his original opinion of Amy Rose had started out different from how he perceived her now. He'd thought Amy was one of those girls who just wanted to go out with him so she could brag to other girls about going out with someone famous, Sonic didn't know much about girls but he knew this one fact at least, but Sonic wasn't famous, well known, nor was he rich, in retrospect he was quite poor. So it was also a mystery to him why Amy Rose still wanted him at all, she seemed too much like a giggling fan girl, the head of a Sonic fan club of which she was practically the only member. If it wasn't creepy enough to have your face plastered over a girls bedroom Sonic didn't know what was. Pop stars may lap up this kind of attention but Sonic in the pit of his stomach, though flattered, detested it. Okay, if one or two people asked for an autograph then maybe he'd oblige, maybe, but a whole crowd of Sonic fans? Some fan girls like Amy? Now that was terrifying. If he wanted to be followed by just one fan girl then Amy Rose was defiantly the girl for the job, he wanted no other.

But had he been wrong about Amy? If the Mask had taught him one thing it was that people can look perfectly ordinary on the outside but they could be complete opposites on the inside. Look at Tails and his alter ego. The fox seemed content with building machines and helping Sonic in his adventures yet deep down Tails wanted payback against all those who had wronged him at school and nearly went so far as to almost kill one of them, Tails had never talked about his days being bullied and seemed happy to just build and construct things that Sonic was surprised that he carried this heavy sadness in his heart. Was it the same for Amy? Originally he'd thought of her as a giggling fan girl who only wanted to go out with him because of what he represented in her mind, not for what he was. A girl so shallow she'd go out with him only for a while, then later grow up and decide her crush on him was just a phase she was going through. But were her feelings for him truly as deep as Amy Gaga made them sound?

Why was he suddenly caring about her? She's been chasing him since he was eleven and for all those years he was never interested in Amy, but at eleven you're not even interested in girls anyway. As he got older he stared to become interested in the opposite gender but he only ever saw Amy as this weird girl he sometimes hung out with.

Sonic wondered for a second why he was suddenly having all of these in depth thoughts about what his friends meant to him and so far all he could say for certain, the only thing that made all his feelings make sense is that, deep down he didn't want to lose Amy Rose.

But then why was Amy even behaving like this now? Dumping a sand castle on his head before fuming at him and running away from him? Silently he cursed, why did the opposite gender have to be so complicated to figure out?

Sonic took a deep breath and sighed. Then something caught his finely tuned senses, but his actions weren't quick enough as something slammed into the sand beside him causing him to fly through the air in a shower of sand. Sonic landed perfectly on his two legs and caught the Mask as it attempted to whistle past him from the impact.

Sonic waited for the dust to clear to see what the heck it was, it was tall, blue and gleaming, a factory fresh robot no doubt created by Dr. Robotnik. It was another Metal Sonic, but there was something different about this one, its head wasn't blue, but green and its red shoes were instead yellow with a red strap. This said to Sonic that this robot wasn't meant to face off against him, it was to face off against Static. This robot was obviously a 'Metal Static.'

Metal Static stared at him for a long moment as if it was considering what the heck Sonic was. It's head turned slightly and Sonic could tell it was focusing its attention on the Mask in his hand. Sonic quickly ducked it behind his back and jammed it between his back quills for safe keeping.

"Another Metal Menace from Robotnik labs, all ready for the junk pile?" Sonic taunted it, but it remained defiantly cool like Metal Sonic had. "You want me? Come and get m-agghhh!..."

In an instant Sonic felt a solid, metallic fist punch right into his face and thought for a second that he'd lost some of his teeth as he flew backwards into a sand dune that was a hundred yards away. The Mask fell from its perch on his back and as he made to grab it Metal seized both it and him and lifted him off the ground by the neck, Sonic flailed his legs trying to kick him while his arms grabbed Metals hand around his neck and tried to pry the machine fingers open.

"Hey, you're more solid then Metal Sonic mark 1 and 2" Sonic choked grinning again "But I'm just warming up." But Metal was ignoring him again and was instead looking from Sonic to the Mask as if trying to figure them out. Then it appeared to make a decision and he began moving the Mask closer to Sonics face!

"Not today pal!" Sonic said in a panic and raised his legs to kick the Mask clean out of Metals hand. But Sonic gave the Mask a bit more of a kick then he was intending because the Mask flew from the metallic grip and flew out of sight like it had been hit with a baseball bat. Then Metal did something Sonic did not expect, he dropped him. Sonic fell to the ground and Metal began moving away via the jet engine in his torso in the direction the Mask had flew off into.

Leaping to his feet Sonic scrambled after Metal, it was difficult to move on the soft sand but he put on as much speed as he could to catch Metal up so he could slam into the robot and knock it to the ground, and that's what he did and it all happened in the span of a few seconds.

Sonic quickly gazed upwards and could barely see the spinning glint of the Mask flying through the air, it was odd but to Sonics eye it looked like it was circling around like a boomerang, only it didn't come back, it just kept changing its direction like it had a mind of its own.

That's when Sonic felt something strike his stomach, Metal Static had now decided Sonic was a threat that needed to be dealt with and had already dealt a quick, unseen blow which left the hedgehog with a dizzy spell. Sonic could see Metal moving away again after the Mask, but Sonic could do very little with that information as his brain was still going in circles.

He willed himself to focus and get a grip, but the world wouldn't stop spinning.

* * *

Amy continued to mope behind a sand dune at how sad her entire life was when she felt something slam into the top of her head with such force her deep well of depression became a fiery volcano of anger. Amy leapt up to her feet gazed around at the offending person who'd thrown the object and ranted.

"Whoever threw that better have life insurance, because I'm not in the mood for childish games!" But there was no one there as far as Amy could see. She shifted her gaze to take in the offending object that had slammed into her head and her mood did not improve when she spotted it. It was that stupid Mask, Sonic must've thrown it at her! Was he making fun of her? She felt her head and a lump was starting to form where it had hit her. Her hammer appeared in her hands and she was tempted to stamp over the dune, finds Sonic and give that spiky rat a few lumps as payback.

But first she knelt down and picked up the Mask from the sand. There was no way Amy was going to give Sonic this back after how cruelly he'd just thrown it at her. She slammed the handle of her hammer in the sand so it stayed up right before she dumped the Mask down the front of her dress where Sonic couldn't get it, not if he had the nerve, then picked up her hammer again and went hedgehog hunting.

She froze however when she turned around and came face to face with a metallic hedgehog. Metal Sonic! Only it was Metal but with a green head! Amy had always hated this machine, not only because it duplicated Sonic but the evil thing had kidnapped her once when she'd followed Sonic on one of his adventures. Only last time she was helpless, this time she had a weapon.

"BACK OFF METAL HEAD!" Amy shouted holding the hammer ready to attack "I'M ARMED THIS TIME!" Metal was so fast Amy nearly didn't have enough time to act. He reached out to grab her by the front of her dress but she'd jumped back with inches to spare. Bad move on his part because Amy swung her hammer and slammed it straight down on Metals head, there was a loud clang and everything froze. Everything that is apart from Amy who's body she could feel was shaking like jelly at the sudden impact as her hammer slammed into something that would not yield to its power

Then Metal raised its right hand and drew it back ready to punch her. "Why do I always think that will work?" she asked herself and as the punch came she screamed "SONIIIIIIICCC OOOOUUFFF!"

CRUNCH!

Metal had punched her so hard in the chest all the air was knocked out of her, and for a second she thought the impact had been so much it had stopped her heart and killed her, but the floating sensation she was having was due to her having been launched high into the sky by the blow. She flew back a good distance, maybe a mile or so before she slammed into another sand dune which cushioned her fall.

When she finally opened her eyes she realised she was still alive! She'd lost her hammer during her short flight and for a second she thought she'd broken some ribs, but as she sat up she felt no pain whatsoever though her torso felt sore where the Mask had been pressed into her.

Amy laughed, that indestructible curse had acted like body armour, cushioning the impact and had probably saved her life. She reached up to feel the Mask, but it wasn't there! She pulled open the neckline of her dress to check but it was gone! It must've fallen out on her short flight, but how? It was far too large to simply slip out from the sides yet it just wasn't there, it had just gone!

Panicking she looked left and right trying to find any trace of a faint glint in the sand that would identify where the Mask was. But it was no good, the Mask had vanished!

The high pitched whine of jet engines caught her ears and she realised that Metal was coming for her. She gulped and considered for a second. It was important that curse didn't find its way into the hands of Robotnik but at the same time Sonic also wanted to get his hands on that Mask, surely he'd find it without her help as he so often wanted. So she turned and hightailed it away from the beach, leaving the Mask to whoever found it first, she was done with that curse anyway, she never wanted to set eyes on it again.

* * *

Sonic raced after Metal after finally losing his dizzy spell. He'd heard Amy's unmistakable scream of "SOOOOOONNNIIIIICCC!" and this made him more determined to find Metal and stop him. Sonic leapt over a sand dunes and saw Metal just standing there. Sonic made to attack but before he could land a blow Metal had taken off again and was already disapearing into the distance without showing any signs he was aware or cared Sonic was there. Sonic was about to follow when he saw Amy's hammer left discarded on the sand like it had been dropped.

Sonic didn't speak, he knelt down and picked up Amy's fallen hammer. "AMY!" he shouted forgetting about Metal altogether, he didn't care about Metal or the Mask right now, all he cared about was making sure Amy was safe. But she was nowhere to be seen. Oh man, he'd never forgive himself if anything had happened to her.

He took a step forward and heard a crunch under his sneakers. He looked down to see what he was standing on. There, half buried in the sand was the Mask! Amy must've found it but Metal found her! But what did Metal do to her? If that tin tyrant's harmed her in any way then Sonic will totally obliterate him!

The hedgehog knelt down to retrieve the Mask, at least Metal hadn't gotten his hands on this stupid thing. Sonic grabbed it and pulled the Mask free. But it took Sonic a second to realise something was wrong with it.

Sonic's eyes went wide and he whistled in amazement. He rubbed his eyes with his free hand to make sure he was seeing it correctly and waved his hand around it to make sure it wasn't a trick of the light, but it was no trick. The indestructable Mask had somehow been broken in half!

"What the heck had the power to cause this?" Sonic asked to no one in particular. According to Tails the Mask was indestructible, it survived lasers, blasters, burning, pressure, everything, so what the heck caused the Mask to simply break like this? The half of the Mask he had was the left hand side and it possessed the metal bar that ran down the front of it, which meant the other half didn't. Wait, other half? Where was the other half? Sonic looked around frantically for anything that looked vaguely like the other half, but he couldn't see anything, mostly because it was still too dark.

Seeing Amy's hammer again Sonic's mind when back to what originally concerned him.

"AMY!" he cried again but again he got no response. He'd never forgive himself it something happened to her now, not just for decencies sake but also because he'd realised he cared too much about her. "AMY!" he cried again and raced this way and that, up and down the beach looking for any flash of pink and red that could be Amy, but there was none. There was no sign of either Amy Rose or the other half of the Mask.

Sonic looked at the cursed Mask again. He was in three minds at the moment, find the missing half of the Mask, find Metal and stopping him, and find Amy. Another thought occurred to Sonic. If the Mask was broken like this would it still work as it would when whole? Sonic scratched the back of his head as he considered this. If it was it could be a mixed blessing because though one half would still be missing, unless whoever found it had the half Sonic held in his hand then it would just be an inert piece of wood for good, then it means this big problem was solved. Also if the Mask didn't work he could focus more on finding Amy and stopping Metal, however to test this meant either two things. First wait to see if it glows, but that depended on if it 'wanted' to glow and the second was to try it on, and so far no glow seemed to appear before his eyes, taking a deep breath he decided on the latter option.

Sonic turned the Mask over and lowered it towards his face, he didn't intend to put it on properly, just to wait until he felt it trying to pull on his face and fuse to him, if that happened he'd know if it was still working and he could pull it away before it tried to take effect. When he couldn't feel any suction at all while it hovered just an inch from his face, he placed the Mask firmly on his face, closed his eyes and waited for something to happen, but still nothing happened. It didn't work! The Mask was now just an inert lump of wood, its curse had been broken!

As his mind celebrated this fact Sonic unprepared as he suddenly winced with pain as the entire left side of his face sharply felt like it was burning! Sonic removed his hand from his face but the Mask didn't fall with it. It was now glowing a shade of green Sonic had never seen it glow before, it was a green Sonic somehow associated with anger, like the Mask itself was furious at being broken, and from the pain it was causing Sonic it was taking its anger out on the next wearer.

The hedgehog reached up and clawed at the half Mask but this time the Mask was putting up far too much of a fight that Sonic couldn't get it off! As it stretched over the left side of his head he felt half of his body go numb and he couldn't breathe, his entire left side was going into spasm! But then just as quickly as it had started it had stopped and Sonic somehow knew he'd become Static again. But something was odd, something didn't make sense. He didn't feel any different...

He held up his right arm and checked it, it looked fine, no difference at all. No sleeve of clothing he wasn't wearing before, no change in anything, even the shine of his blue coat, nothing, he was totally normal. Then he lifted his left arm, but strangely it wouldn't obey this simple command. He tried again but his left arm stubbornly refused to move and remained by his side.

"Whoa! Man, I've got a splitting headache!" Sonic said as his left arm moved up to feel his head, but Sonic had not wanted to say any such thing, his mouth, lips and tongue had moved of their own accord and the voice, the voice that came from it, it was...

"What?" Sonic asked meekly not wanting to accept the thought that was forming in his head, this time it was his voice that did escape his own lips.

"Who said that?" said the voice that had taken over Sonic's mouth before and had done so again. Sonics left hand then moved of its own accord and it ran itself through his quills. Sonic had feeling in his left arm but he couldn't control its movements. He was aware he had an itch on his stomach but was too stunned to scratch it. His left arm dived down and grabbed his right and pulled it up. "What's with this limp arm? I've got an itch that needs scratching!"

Sonic took control of his right hand and began feeling his face and could feel his left side had a rubbery texture his right side lacked and it was divided perfectly down the middle. "Hey, what's with the rogue arm?" the voice asked.

"Hey, wait a minute?" said the new voice as Sonics left arm had somehow produced a handheld mirror and his hand automatically tilted it so Sonic could get a good look at his own face.

Sonic stared at his reflection.

"Hey! What are you doing here?" said Static from the left side of Sonic's body. Clearly the Mask stilled worked but instead of turning all of Sonic into Static it had just transformed half of Sonic into Static. The Mask had split Sonic the hedgehog perfectly straight down the middle, the right half of his body was the blue blur, Sonic the Hedgehog, the left side of his body had the green, rubbery face of Static complete with those large teeth. Static's red eye glared at Sonic accusingly while Sonic glared in disbelief at Static.

"You have got to be kidding me!" both of them said at the same time.

* * *

**TO BE CONTINUED...**

* * *

**Authors notes:** One story arc people wanted me to do in my Mario and Luigi: the Mask cartoon is have a story where the mask breaks into two pieces, and though I'd love to do a story like that unfortunatly the way I have constructed the series makes it difficult, due to both Mario and Luigi having no voice and comunicating in gibberish and hand gestures.

So instead I decided to write it into this one for the main reason that think seeing Sonic argue with himself is something worth writing about.

This one took a while to write because I kept changing my mind about what I think would be going through the characters heads at this moment, but so far I feel happy with it.

Cheers


End file.
